- Hardcover: 200 pages
- Publisher: Jonathan Cape Ltd; 1st ed edition (15 April 1993)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0224035878
- ISBN-13: 978-0224035873
- Product Dimensions: 20.8 x 14 x 2.8 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 383,596 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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More About the Author
Product Description
Amazon.co.uk Review
Written on The Body is a tender dissection of erotic love. The prose is like a poem, lush with wit and imagery, but behind the luxuriant relish of the words, there is a scalpel-sharp cut of emotions. Love and longing are the wounds through which Winterson's imagery flows. The novel begins with regret: "Why is the measure of love loss? It hasn't rained in three months ... The grapes have withered on the vine." The narrator is also suffering from a heart-stricken drought. She is grieving for the loss of her true love, Louise.
Louise has flowing Pre-Raphaelite hair, and a body besieged by leukaemia, her cells waging war: "here they come, hurtling through the bloodstream trying to pick a fight." But Louise is not dead, merely abandoned by the narrator with the best of intentions. As the lament continues, striking in its beauty and dazzling inventiveness, more of the love story is revealed. The narrator has been a female Lothario, falling in love, and out again, swaggering like Mercutio. But then she meets Louise, married to Elgin--"very eminent, very dull, very rich"--and is hopelessly, helplessly smitten: "I didn't only want Louise's flesh, I wanted her bones, her blood, her tissues, the sinews that bound her together." Elgin persuades her to leave for the good of Louise's health, and all is undone.
Winterson does not shy away from grief, or joy. She has acutely described how love can transform a life, but also destroy it too. But, for Winterson, where there is love there is hope: "I stretch out my hand and reach the corners of the world ... I don't know if this is a happy ending but here we are let loose in open fields." Eithne Farry --This text refers to the Paperback edition.
Product Description
A novel of loss and love. The author has also written "Sexing the Cherry" and "Oranges are Not the Only Fruit" which won the 1985 Whitbread Prize and was later adapted as an award-winning BBC dramatization. Her book "The Passion" won the 1987 John Llewellyn Rhys Memorial Prize.
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First Sentence
Why is the measure of love loss? Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt
Why is the measure of love loss? Read the first page
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Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
18 of 20 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I read this years ago knowing nothing about Jeanette Winterson and devoured it in one session. As a lesbian I identified the narrator as female and one I could really relate to. I have reread the book a number of times and find it multilayered and as beautiful as good poetry, the fact that so few things are spelt out and so much is hinted at appealed to me rather than the reverse. It is the only book of hers I love perhaps because of those things, perhaps because despite the fact she chooses not to be straightforward in style, I find so many of the things she writes about love and the experience of it deeply accurate. People are not simple and nor are lives, I found in her writing revelations on human nature that touched me, made me think hard, and ultimately changed some ignorances I had about myself forever. It is a passionate book about a passionate love and to my mind one of the most successfully done, especially in the lesbian field of literature.
14 of 16 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This is absolutely my favourite book ever. I've read it 100 times, and I always find something new there. The truths Winterson writes of love have the power to make me break down in tears, and I turn to this book again and again.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
A beautifully written love story. Like other works I've read by this author, it is sometimes brilliant and sometimes less than that, but this is, for me, one of her easiest and most enjoyable novels. Much is made of the fact that we're never told if the narrator is male or female, but it could only really be a woman writing like this, which of course makes it a lesbian love affair. This is irrelevant in this book (don't bother buying this if you're looking for steamy lesbian sex) but I do sometimes wonder why such a high percentage of good writers just happen to be lesbians.
Well let's just be grateful for what they write. Jeanette Winterson is one of the best writers around today, and this is one of her best books.
Well let's just be grateful for what they write. Jeanette Winterson is one of the best writers around today, and this is one of her best books.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Oh beautiful
This is a beautiful, beautiful story. The protagonist remains gender-neutral throughout... I bought this book just to lend it to friends who I know will connect with it as much as... Read more
Published 7 months ago by Mike
The language of love
Written on the Body is the fourth book by Jeannette Winterson. It is written in first person by a narrator whose name, gender and age are never revealed to us. Read more
Published 10 months ago by Ms Zion Lights
Novel cobbled from journal notes
I usually love Jeanette Winterson and eagerly awaited receipt of this novel and but for some decidedly funny sections and areas of good writing especially in the front, it dwindled... Read more
Published on 10 Feb 2010 by Cl Smith
self-indulgent
I actually enjoyed this book but I felt that the writer was incredibly self-indulgent and a little pretentious, despite some fabulous imagery in places. Read more
Published on 23 Aug 2009 by HT
Outstanding
This is honestly one of the best and most beautiful books I have ever read. Gorgeous prose.
It should move any romantic, and anyone who has been in (or is in) love will... Read more
It should move any romantic, and anyone who has been in (or is in) love will... Read more
Published on 26 Jan 2009 by Josephine Louise
beautiful
This is truly one of my favourite books. It is beautifully written, with so much insight and emotion. Read more
Published on 8 May 2006 by teary chocolate
Correction to the Amazon Review
I just wanted it noted that the amazon review is misleading. The major reason why this is well known in 'philosophical circles', particularly continental is that as one reader... Read more
Published on 4 Jun 2004
Pure Brilliance
This book,for me is my ultimate favourite.It is full of lyrical prose and sweeps the reader along in a sea of emotions.I really identified with this book,like I have no other. Read more
Published on 13 May 2004 by SUSAN
The other side of an affair: The Lovers point of view.
A first person tale of love, loss, and the lingering effects of Adultery from the Lovers point of view; I found this book to be very introspective and insightful. Read more
Published on 10 Feb 2004 by "usgirldiver"
The most intense love story ever written ?
This is jeanette's masterpiece..if you have ever loved with every molecule of your being, then here is your story, the pain, the glory, the devastation, the passion, betrayal... Read more
Published on 11 Oct 2001 by Max
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