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Title: Wings of the Dove
Author: Henry James
Narrator: Prunella Scales
Format: Abridged
Length: 2 hrs and 51 mins
Language: English
Release date: 04-30-15
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers Limited
Genres: Fiction, Literary
Publisher's Summary:
The vivacious Kate Croy finds herself torn between love and money, friendship and ambition; 'the crown of Henry James's achievement.'
Now a critically acclaimed film.
Critic Reviews:
"Prunella Scales's cultivated tones are well matched to the cadences of Jamesian language. In some of his scenes of satrirical observation her delivery of dialogue cleverly highlights a gentle but piercing wit." (Herald)
"Listeners are likely to be drawn into the novel and rewarded for having chosen the aural route as opposed to the more arduous, printed path. James's dense style is leavened when read aloud. This makes the descriptive passages more evocative and the dialogue more active and convincing." (Observer)
Members Reviews:
Depth
One of two of my favorite Henry James stories. He has written with such power and depth of understanding of the times.
Encompassing! He paints with language like others a brush...This book requires the readers strictest attention and is well worth ones devotion!!
wings of the dove
Henry James at his best. The understatement is wonderful throughout. The plot is thin but the characterisations make up for it.
I loved it, but not the first time through.
Five stars means I loved it, but not the first time through. If I hadn't had some moral obligation to finish it, I doubt I would have. The prose is as dense as The Master gets, and that's jungle-thick. The second time through, I began to see why it has earned the praise it has as one of Henry James's great novels. By the third time through, I thought it was brilliant, and would gladly read it a fourth time, and more. But like most great works of art, it doesn't yield up its rewards easily.
The density of the prose isn't Henry James trying to be difficult. This is an author (probably in many conversations and correspondences with his brother, the great psychologist William James) determined to express the very complicated psychology of complex human beings, a psychology that steps forward and backward and sideways . No character is just one thing: a conniving money-grubber, a social-climbing heiress, a thwarted lover, a very rich American naif. Each of these characters reveals layer upon layer of contradictory motives, second and third thoughts, unexpected generosities. Several of them are troubled by the ethics of their motives, and the final pages will leave you wondering whose ethics will prevail.
But that's as James intended. "I honor George Eliot above all other novelists," he said, "but she tells too much." Henry James, for all his words, makes you, the reader, complete his late novels.
Wings of the Dove
Couldn't finish it.