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A review by juliana_aldous
Justine by Lawrence Durrell
5.0
Woke up in the middle of the night and decided to finish this. This is my second Durrell book--I read his travel memoir Bitter Lemons of Cyprus which I adored. The prose in this book which is the first of the Alexandria Quartet is breathtaking. I had my Kindle highlighter on and running.
I posted this one the other day which sums of the kind of prose and imagery you will find: "In a grocer's window I saw a small tin of olives with the name Orvieto on it, and overcome by a sudden longing to be on the right side of the Mediterranean, entered the shop: bought it; had it opened there and then: and sitting down at a marble table in that gruesome light I began to eat Italy, its dark scorched flesh, hand-modelled spring soil, dedicated vines."
This was a good book to read with a Kindle-I found both the dictionary as well as the X-Ray of the book helpful to track characters.
And thank you Internet--I was able to listen to a portion of this audio of Lawrence Durrell speaking at UCLA in 1972. In the audio he talks about his friendship with Henry Miller and other writers. https://youtu.be/4ZTajhgR82M Also sort of fun--this audio at first sounds like it could have been recorded recently until the questions start. At about 17:40 some idiot poet starts off calling those around him intellectual facists, mentions he isn't allowed on campus during the day for political reasons, whines that poets should be able to make money, and then goes on to demand Durrell read him because he is "quite good." Something you could only find on campus between the late sixties and early seventies.
I posted this one the other day which sums of the kind of prose and imagery you will find: "In a grocer's window I saw a small tin of olives with the name Orvieto on it, and overcome by a sudden longing to be on the right side of the Mediterranean, entered the shop: bought it; had it opened there and then: and sitting down at a marble table in that gruesome light I began to eat Italy, its dark scorched flesh, hand-modelled spring soil, dedicated vines."
This was a good book to read with a Kindle-I found both the dictionary as well as the X-Ray of the book helpful to track characters.
And thank you Internet--I was able to listen to a portion of this audio of Lawrence Durrell speaking at UCLA in 1972. In the audio he talks about his friendship with Henry Miller and other writers. https://youtu.be/4ZTajhgR82M Also sort of fun--this audio at first sounds like it could have been recorded recently until the questions start. At about 17:40 some idiot poet starts off calling those around him intellectual facists, mentions he isn't allowed on campus during the day for political reasons, whines that poets should be able to make money, and then goes on to demand Durrell read him because he is "quite good." Something you could only find on campus between the late sixties and early seventies.