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The Blue Flower
 
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The Blue Flower (Paperback)

by Penelope Fitzgerald (Author)
3.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (4 customer reviews)

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Product details

  • Paperback: 240 pages
  • Publisher: Houghton Mifflin (Trade); 1st U.S. Ed edition (28 Jul 1997)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0395859972
  • ISBN-13: 978-0395859971
  • Product Dimensions: 21 x 14 x 1.6 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 274,994 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

    Popular in this category:

    #14 in  Books > Fiction > Authors, A-Z > F > Fitzgerald, Penelope

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Product Description

Synopsis
Presents a fictionalized account of the relationship between the eighteenth-century German poet known as Novalis and his true love, Sophie.

From the Publisher
Winner of the National Book Critics' Circle Award
From the reviews of The Blue Flower "The Blue Flower is an enchanting novel about heart, body and mind. The writing is elliptical and witty... so that what could be a sad little love story is constantly funny and always absorbing with a cast of characters both endearing and amusing. This novel is a jewel." Carmen Callil, Daily Telegraph

"Her sense of time and place is marvellously deft, done in a few words. She knows how they all walked, eased their old joints. She knows the damp smell of decay of the ancient schlosses. In a bare little book she reveals a country and an age as lost as Tolstoy's Russia and which we seem somehow always to have known." Jane Gardam, Spectator

"Detail, expertly dabbed in, provides a substantial background for the story of a poet which, it is subtly suggested, is also the story of a remarkable moment in the history of civilisation... It is hard to see how the hopes and defeats of Romanticism, or the relation between inspiration and common life, between genius and mere worthiness, could be more deftly rendered than they are in this admirable novel." Frank Kermode, London Review of Books

"A minor miracle of sympathy and crispness." Adam Mars-Jones, Guardian

"An extraordinary imagining...an original masterpiece." Hermione Lee, Financial Times

"A novel in which the unsaid speaks; it is a masterpiece." Candia McWilliam

"A masterpiece. How does she do it?" A.S. Byatt

"A magical little book." Doris Lessing

"Her limpid, exact prose reflects an unwaveringly clear view of the human predicament. She seems to be one of those rare artists gifted with both the knowledge of how things are, and the skill to record what she knows with s ubtlety and devestating truthfulness." A.N. Wilson, Evening Standard --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

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Customer Reviews

4 Reviews
5 star:
 (1)
4 star:
 (1)
3 star:
 (1)
2 star:
 (1)
1 star:    (0)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
3.5 out of 5 stars (4 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
28 of 32 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars She doesnt hand this one to you, 28 Nov 2002
By taking a rest - See all my reviews
(TOP 50 REVIEWER)   
This review is from: The Blue Flower (Paperback)
"I have remained true to my deepest convictions, I mean to the courage of those who are born to be defeated, the weaknesses of the strong, and the tragedy of misunderstandings and missed opportunities, which I have done my best to treat as comedy, for otherwise how can we manage to bear it?"

The quote above appeared in a story about Penelope Fitzgerald written just after her death. The quote and the ideas it states appear to be very appropriate to "The Blue Flower". I have read two other works of hers "The Bookshop" and "The Golden Child". All three books share her wonderful style of writing, which she can modify to produce three very different books, all the while maintaining the quality of her writing, while demonstrating incredible range.

Of the three I have read this work is the one she makes you work the hardest for. The two previous books laid out their stories in comfortable, familiar settings, both in place and time. The books were constructed so the reader was able to follow a distinct story line. In the case of "The Blue Flower" the story and her method of telling it leaves the reader to fill in the details necessary to make the story flow in a more conventional manner, to read more easily, more comfortably. For those who want all the details, all the motivation of the characters detailed and laid out with a beginning, middle, and end, this work may not rate as one of their favorite works.

This book was comparatively lengthy set side by side with the other books I have mentioned. The briefer works are very straightforward, and I commented when I wrote about "The Bookshop" that I was curious with what she would do with the added length. True to her having been not only a brilliant and highly original Authoress, as the length of her work expanded, it became more complex, less apparent, but yet another phenomenal read.
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25 of 29 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars A surprisingly enjoyable, thought-provoking read, 26 Jan 2001
By A Customer
This review is from: The Blue Flower (Paperback)
Not the type of book I would normally read, I picked up Penelope Fitzgerald's The Blue Flower rather reluctantly, since it was recommended by my local book club. The cover blurb mentioned the book's central theme, the relationship between the late 18th century German poet and philosopher Hardenburg and 12 year old Sophie von Kuhn, his 'true philosophy' who captured his heart and became his fiancee. So I wasn't quite sure what to expect from this book. However, Fitzgerald's flowing prose and excellent portrayal of the mood and social mores of the times when the book is set soon had me entranced and involved in the story. I was fascinated by the way the suprememly intelligent but very naive Hardenburg falls completely under the spell of the adolescent and not-very-bright Sophie. But as the story unfolded and Sophie's illness touched other people, I too found myself falling under the spell of this young girl. This tale, of course, is based on real lives, and Fitzgerald's afterword rounds the book off nicely. Having read The Blue Flower, I am now keen to read more of Fitzgerald's work, as she has the knack of bringing history to life.
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4 of 22 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars Wilting Flower, 26 Jan 2008
By Ford Ka (Edinburgh, Scotland) - See all my reviews
  
This review is from: The Blue Flower (Paperback)
Having obtain some information about the lives of Byron, Shelley, Goether, and the like I lived happily convinced that the Romantic poets usually lived up to their name. Penelope Fitzgerald sadly proved me wrong. Their life was mundane, boring, without flair, and they were rather lucky to die young. Fortunately, she needs only mere two hundred pages to bring this truth home. She does so in a charming style and some of her descriptions and information is quite amusing (the washing - one per year) but otherwise the book is flimsy and fluffy. Don't expect to learn much or understand much. According to the blurps on the back cover "the unspoken speaks through this book" - I must be part deaf then.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars "Novels arise out of the shortcomings of history. (Novalis)"
This has been my first Fitzgerald novel and the story's topic intrigued me more than anything else. Novalis, Friedrich von Hardenberg's pen name, under which he became famous for... Read more
Published 9 days ago by Friederike Knabe

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