The Hours by Michael Cunningham
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Book Reviews of The Hours
Book Review: A Modern Masterpiece
Summary: 5 Stars
I decided to write this brief review as an apology to Mr. Cunningham, for having ever doubted his abilities. I approached "The Hours" with a degree of skepticism. Maybe, on a subconscious level, I didn't think I could relate to a novel about three women. Stupid, I realize, but I can think of no other explanations. In any case, I was wrong.
Cunningham has penned a modern, literary masterpiece. His style, while a little too flowery for my tastes, meshes well with his story. Indeed, his command of the English language is intimidating: Cunningham's work has the air of a master poet who has decided to turn his skill to prose. The following excerpt, chosen more-or-less at random, illustrates the point:
"Only the heel of that foot, one hand, and one fleshless buttock remain in contact with the battered wood. On his robe, red-finned rockets emit perfect orange pinecones of fire. Helmeted astronauts, plump and white as the Uniroyal Man, faceless behind their dark visors, offer stiff, white-gloved salutes."
The story behind "The Hours" is simple to the point of deception: a woman prepares a celebration for her sick, poet friend, a woman bakes a cake for her husband's birthday, and Virginia Woolf battles painful headaches while writing "Mrs. Dalloway." But these three women share a complex bond they will never fully understand.
It is a rare achievement for an author to extract the profound from the seemingly mundane. "The Hours" is one of those rare achievements, "a cut above the rest," worth reading, discussing, and re-reading.
Book Review: Read this before ordering!!!
Summary: 5 Stars
Although I rated this book one of my favorites of all time IT IS NOT FOR EVERYONE.SO...
Do not buy this book if:
-You do not like highly-nuanced texts
-You are homophobic
-You prefer action-packed, in-your-face messages and themes
DO read this book if:
-You have seen the movie and enjoyed it
-You enjoy the work of Virginia Wolf
-You are able to "get" and enjoy dark, enigmatic plotting and theme exploration
My personal review: I read the book and saw the movie and loved both equally. The film is brilliant and rounds out the book beautifully. Kidman, Moore, and Ed Harris each give powerful, perfect performances in their leading roles. Alison Janey, Toni Collette, Claire Daines, and Jeff Daniels are equally as powerful in supporting roles. It is Streep however, as usual, who really carries the film. She is, beyond doubt, the most capable actress ever to appear on film. There are moments in the movie where you literally cannot believe how someone can consistently give an audience such amazingly real and unbelievingly touching performances.
The book is brilliantlly written and the movie is a perfect compliment to the book.
This book taught me that: 1) happiness is about collective moments and hours, not days and years; 2) people die so that others may more appreciate life and 3) we all must begin to stare life honestly in the face in order to ever really learn to be happy.
I absolutely loved this book. Hope you do too. Review: stunning
Summary: 5 Stars
i can't remember the last time a book tore into me so deeply (and i read A LOT). michael cunningham constructed a book of such intricate beauty, and intimate, significant musings - that it's difficult to even know where to begin.
you can read the editorial reviews to piece out a synopsis of the plot - yet the plot almost feels insignificant in comparison to the sweep of emotion the novel left me with.
the clever way he weaves the stories of the three women together (virginia woolf, mrs. brown, and clarissa) is fascinating, but "clever" is hardly the word i would use to classify this book in any way.
i was simply struck by the interior monologues of the women in the book... their thoughts on life and death have a touching truth to them - i felt as though michael cunningham had drilled a whole into the inner depths of my psyche, and found the words to describe what i've been thinking all along- thinking, but lacking the patience and the drive to map it out so clearly.
i have yet to see the movie, but the previews send shivers down my spine. it will be incredibly interesting to see how a novel immersed im the interior makes its' exterior transformation onto the big screen.
aside from my personal musings on how the book spoke to me, etc, it's well worth the read- it's a beautiful book filled with passages worth committing to memory, and although it is experimental in its' own way, it isn't pretentious or difficult to read.
i rarely close the pages of a book feeling as though i have somehow changed, but in this case i did.
Book Review: Intersecting lives
Summary: 5 Stars
Get ready for a powerfully moving book. The Hours is a fascinating tale of intersecting lives. From my perspective, it is about characters who are connected through different incarnations. I especially related to this aspect since I believe in reincarnation. The Hours had a spiritual dimension which I appreciated since I am the author of a spiritually-themed novel entitled "The Misadventures of Sister Mary Olga Fortitude."
The book skillfully moves between two story lines which are set in different times. Virginia Woolf's tragic life is sensitively portrayed in a manner that will help the reader to develop empathy for someone who has suffered from a bipolar disorder. That is something else to which I can relate, having suffered from a lifetime of debilitating depressions.
As I see it, the wonderful character that is portrayed in the movie of the book by Julianne Moore is the reincarnation of Virginia Woolf. She obviously suffers from her own form of depression which only seems to escalate as she reads Woolf's novel, "Mrs. Dalloway."
Michael Cunningham has a gift for painting beautifully lush word pictures that capture the multiple settings in the novel along with fleshing out its multifaceted characters. If you like this book, you will definitely want to read his others. He truly has the gift for writing superb dramatic fiction. Don't miss this book! It was a transforming experience for me.
Davis Aujourd'hui, author of "The Misadventures of Sister Mary Olga Fortitude"
Book Review: stunning.
Summary: 5 Stars
This is nothing short of a masterpiece. As one drifts into its pages, one cannot help get lost in the beautiful stream-of-consciousness prose written by michael cunningham, in a marvelous tribute to virginia woolf, one of the novel's central characters.The novel covers one day in the lives of three women, two fictional, one real: Laura Brown, a troubled 50s suburban housewife in debt to her loving husband, son, and unborn child, but struggling with the fact that she is stuck in a one-sided marriage; as much as she tries, she does not love her husband as much as she wishes she did. The second fictional character is Clarissa Vaughan, a bisexual present-day resident of Manhattan, who is caring for friend and former lover Richard, a recognized and award winning poet, who is dying of AIDS. The third character, a real historical figure, is Viriginia Woolf, also in a marriage that restrains her; although she loves her husband she longs for city life in London, which would free her but also free her deadly mental illness.
These three women are all connected through Woolf, as Laura reads Woolf's novels in an attempt to block out the real world, Clarissa lives a modern version of Woolf's "Mrs. Dalloway," and the third character Woolf herself.
In his Pulitzer-Prize winning masterpiece, author Michael Cunningham manages to create a tribute to a master writer as well as a stunning original work rolled into one beautifully-written prose composition.