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.The Remains of the Day

by: Kazuo Ishiguro

March 03, 2005
I loved this absolutely beautifully written book and read it in one sitting. Narrated by an English butler, Mr Stevens (we never know his first name), it is a truly moving tale. From the day he sets off on his journey, the story captivates you until the final pages. I loved his definitions of the word 'dignity' and I would thoroughly recommend this as an excellent, enthralling read of times gone by. I wished it had been longer! It won the Booker prize and for once, you can see why.
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.Where Angels Fear to Tread (Twentieth Century Classics)

by: E.M. Forster

November 30, 1989
I first read this as a 6th form text in New Zealand in 1963 when texts were not prescribed. It was the choice of an inspired teacher who introduced us also to Janet Frame & Sylvia Ashton Warner. She ( & the novel) have remained with me for ever - we were allowed no references, had to respond only to what we read. Since then I have discovered much, including Italy, met the middle class values, etc. To revisit the novel is wonderful.


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.A Room With A View (Special Edition) [1985]

starring: Maggie Smith, Helena Bonham Carter, Rupert Graves, Daniel Day Lewis, Judi Dench
directed by: James Ivory

October 29, 2007
The film begins well, and the whole of the Italian part is fascinating, and holds one's interest. But once the plot, such as it is, moves to England, things begin to go downhill. The pace slows down to a crawl, the acting flags a little, and the dullness of the original novel begins to show through. E.M. Forster was obsessed with the hypocrisy, as he saw it, of the well-to-do English middle class in the early 1900s, and the novel is all about the virtually unbridgeable gap between staid and snobbish conventional well-to-do folk on the one hand, and broad-minded free thinkers on the other. The film succeeds brilliantly in conveying the stuffy, suffocating atmosphere of Edwardian upper middle class life as perceived by Forster, but unfortunately the tedium and ... Read More:
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.Howards End (Penguin Twentieth Century Classics)

by: E.M. Forster, David Lodge

April 27, 2006
I was FORCED to study this novel for a-level english literature and LOATHED it! I found it very difficult to stay awake when reading it due to the dull and unrealistic storylines.

I would by no means recommend this novel to anyone. Looking back on the time spent reading and re-reading the book only reminds me of the days I wasted! Now that I have completed my a-levels, nothing would bring me greater satisfaction than to burn the book that bored me to death!
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.Duchess of Malfi (New Mermaids)

by: John Webster

August 29, 2003
Webster is scarcely known outside university departments and some enlightened secondary schools who have used him on A-level syllabuses. This is a pity...and a scandal. It means that he is vastly undervalued, if rated at all. His two main plays are great works of art and he is one of the very finest playwrights in existence. Read, and re-read.
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.To the Lighthouse (Wordsworth Classics)

by: Virginia Woolf

February 07, 1994
'One sees a fin passing far out. What image can I reach to convey what I mean? Really there is none, I think.'

Woolf writing in her diary of 1925 reveals her life long concern with the problematic representation of experience. Her sense of reality's ineffability haunted all her major novels and in To the Lighthouse perhaps her art found its greatest expression.

The novel begins with a promise, a promise made by a mother to her small child that he can go and visit the lighthouse near where the large family holiday each year. It ends with the Lighthouse being reached finally years later after the mother's death. The process that takes us from a casual promise to its manifestation is for me one of the most magical journeys in literature. I'll be braver ... Read More:
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.A Passage to India

by: E.M. Forster

July 28, 2005
Almost a century after the book's publication the most crucial problems it discussed are as current as they were during Forster's life. The impossibility of communicating across the divide of culture, religion, and race, seems to be even more alive then when he saw it. The value of the novel lies not so much in representing it but in the fact that Forster offers a way out - personal contact. There is little chance people will suddenly like Muslims, Pakistanis, gays, lesbians, Moroccans, Turkish, Kurds etc etc - there is a chance (a very slim chance, Forster would be quick to add) that an American and a Muslim, a Turk and a Kurd, an Israeli and a Palestinian can be friends. The world may not want it, the people that surround them may not want it but the results depend on us alone. If ... Read More:
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.A Passage to India

by: E.M. Forster

September 03, 1998
While the themes of this novel (largely racism and prejudice) are, sadly, apparently timeless, I didn't feel this novel had aged particularly well. The narrative style is definitely `of its age' which, for a modern reader, might be too slow and objective - too divorced from its content, making what should be a heart-rending, heart-stopping story just a bit of a drag. I don't feel this is an inevitable result of the age of the novel. Other classics - many much older, such as Dickens or Austen - retain an immediacy and a humanity across the decades, even centuries. But A Passage to India is - in style - much as it is in content: a study of a stuffier time.
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.A Room with a View [2007]

starring: Laurence Fox, Timothy Spall, Rafe Spall, Elaine Cassidy

January 12, 2009
I really liked the idea of this, to do something non-Merchant Ivory with a Forster novel adaptation. It's not that I don't like the MI version, I love it, but I could have put it to one side had this been a great adapataion. Unfortunately it was thoroughly disappointing, especially adding an ending which, if my copy of the book is to be believed, Forster would not have approved of.

The acting is OK on the whole, but it's hard going for the most part because it appears to be trying so hard not to be Merchant Ivory. Timothy Spall and Sophie Thompson are both good, but the leads are too insipid.

On the ending: Forster (in some editions) adds a postscript to the story. In this he quite clearly states that George Emerson refused to go to war in WW1, so that whole section is just an ... Read More:
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.The Whitsun Weddings (Faber Poetry)

by: Philip Larkin

May 08, 2001


Looking at the previous reviews I find it quite adverse that someone would condemn a book of poetry because it isn't 'perky' enough. I thought poetry was about so much more than just lifting the spirits.

I myself am 17, studying The Whitsun Weddings for my AS level. Incontestably, it is of a depressive nature, but I do not view this as a possible criticism of the book. This is the very thing that makes it a worthwhile read. Larkin's pessimistic/realist views on matters such as monogamy and marriage, consumerism and generally pre-idealised life are yes, very blunt and negative, but something we have all atleast pondered on. I think his work is very enjoyable. With his arrogance constantly juxaposed with his feelings of inadequacy, I felt like I could despise him, and at the same time, completely ... Read More:
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