Marcus reviewed The Line of Beauty by Alan Hollinghurst
Review of 'The Line of Beauty' on 'Goodreads'
DNF
Hardcover, 438 pages
English language
Published Feb. 3, 2004 by Bloomsbury.
4 stars
(12 reviews)
It is the summer of 1983, and twenty-year-old Nick Guest has moved into an attic room in the Notting Hill home of the Feddens: conservative Member of Parliament Gerald, his wealthy wife Rachel, and their two children, Toby--whom Nick had idolized at Oxford--and Catherine, highly critical of her family's assumptions and ambitions, who becomes both a friend to Nick and his uneasy responsibility.
As the boom years of the mid-eighties unfold, Nick, an innocent in matters of politics and money, becomes caught up in the Feddens' world--its grand parties, its surprising alliances, its parade of monsters both comic and menacing. In an era of endless possibility, he finds himself able to pursue his own private obsession with beauty--a prize as compelling to him as power and riches to his friends. An affair with a young black clerk gives him his first experience of romance, but it is a later affair …
It is the summer of 1983, and twenty-year-old Nick Guest has moved into an attic room in the Notting Hill home of the Feddens: conservative Member of Parliament Gerald, his wealthy wife Rachel, and their two children, Toby--whom Nick had idolized at Oxford--and Catherine, highly critical of her family's assumptions and ambitions, who becomes both a friend to Nick and his uneasy responsibility.
As the boom years of the mid-eighties unfold, Nick, an innocent in matters of politics and money, becomes caught up in the Feddens' world--its grand parties, its surprising alliances, its parade of monsters both comic and menacing. In an era of endless possibility, he finds himself able to pursue his own private obsession with beauty--a prize as compelling to him as power and riches to his friends. An affair with a young black clerk gives him his first experience of romance, but it is a later affair with a beautiful millionaire that will change his life drastically and bring into question the larger fantasies of a ruthless decade.
Framed by the two general elections that returned Margaret Thatcher to power, The Line of Beauty unfurls through four extraordinary years of change and tragedy. Richly textured, emotionally charged, disarmingly funny, this is a major work by one of our finest writers. (front flap)
seabelis reviewed The Line of Beauty by Alan Hollinghurst
Review of 'The Line of Beauty' on 'Goodreads'
2 stars
While the writing itself was exceptional, the author can really capture those subtle details, I struggled with the narrative itself. Nick's personal story was engaging, but I have the sense that much of the author's point will be missed by those with knowledge of Thatcher's policies and British politics in general, including myself.
Sharyl reviewed Line of Beauty by Alan Hollinghurst
Review of 'Line of Beauty' on 'Goodreads'
5 stars
A gorgeously written book. Since so many people before me have provided such complete summaries, I will simply pick out one of many paragraphs that moved me.
"What really was his understanding with Wani? The pursuit of love seemed to need the cultivation of indifference. The deep connection between them was so secret that at times it was hard to believe it existed. He wondered if anyone knew--had even a flicker of a guess, an intuition blinked away by its own absurdity. How could anyone tell? He felt there must always be hints of a secret affair, some involuntary tenderness or respect, a particular way of not noticing each other...He wondered if it ever would be known, or if they would take the secret to the grave. For a minute he felt unable to move, as if he were hypnotized by Wani's image..."
And the paragraph that alludes to the …
A gorgeously written book. Since so many people before me have provided such complete summaries, I will simply pick out one of many paragraphs that moved me.
"What really was his understanding with Wani? The pursuit of love seemed to need the cultivation of indifference. The deep connection between them was so secret that at times it was hard to believe it existed. He wondered if anyone knew--had even a flicker of a guess, an intuition blinked away by its own absurdity. How could anyone tell? He felt there must always be hints of a secret affair, some involuntary tenderness or respect, a particular way of not noticing each other...He wondered if it ever would be known, or if they would take the secret to the grave. For a minute he felt unable to move, as if he were hypnotized by Wani's image..."
And the paragraph that alludes to the novel's title--
"The double curve was Hogarth's 'line of beauty', the snakelike flicker of an instinct, of two compulsions held in one unfolding movement. He ran his hand down Wani's back. He didn't think Hogarth had illustrated this best example of it, the dip and swell --- he had chosen harps and branches, bones rather than flesh. Really it was time for a new Analysis of Beauty".
This novel is so much more than I'd expected. It depicts London in the 1980s, during the socially conservative Margaret Thatcher years. There's an undercurrent of racism and class snobbery and all that hypocrisy, and of course homophobia and the tragic spread of AIDS.
Nick Guest is aptly named, since he is always the outsider. He is living with his friend (not lover) Toby and his family, in the opulent surroundings and society of the upper class, while he writes his thesis on the style of Henry James. Toby's father Gerald is a member of parliament who is eventually implicated in a couple scandals. It also comes out that Nick, while living under the same roof, has been having a homosexual affair with the son of a famously rich man. Gerald scapegoats Nick, and in the end, the friendships Nick had held onto for years are exposed as meaningless charades, while his closest lovers die. Everything comes to an end, as Nick's young life will, too. It's all so sad, but also so beautifully written. This story will stay with me for quite some time.
Subjects
- University of Oxford -- Alumni and alumnae -- Fiction
- Male friendship -- Fiction
- Social classes -- Fiction
- Married people -- Fiction
- Legislators -- Fiction
- Rich people -- Fiction
- Young men -- Fiction
- Gay men -- Fiction
- Psychological fiction
- Notting Hill (London, England) -- Fiction