The Death of the Heart

I bought this book based on thoughtful reviews posted, and so glad I did.

It feels perfectly ridiculous to be sitting here alloting stars to a writer as established in the firmament as Elizabeth Bowen. She is one of the great contemporary writers, and she was teaching when I was in college. We were too young to be in awe of her, but reading or especially rereading Bowen is one of the greatest pleasures of a lifetime. This is my favorite of her novels, but she hasn't written a single one I don't... Read Full Review

I don't know what those who called this Bowen masterpiece "boring" expected of this novel. Perhaps they hoped for a simple, bland, beach-blanket novel they could skim in a day. I'm sure they were disappointed to find that this is an intense, at times intellectually difficult novel to read. Bowen's descriptions of the inner workings of an adolescent girl often require a second or third reading. This is not because her writing... Read Full Review

The reviewers who have come before me have variously praised this fine book, and called Elizabeth Bowen a sadist. Quite so. This book has the suicidal weariness of Brideshead Revisited, and a protagonist that you'd like to shake some sense into, a la Of Human Bondage. That said, both the prose and the dialogue are pure pleasure to read. If you find this book a downer, cleanse your palate with I Capture The Castle, the... Read Full Review

An extraordinary book--far and away Bowen's best, and one of the most perfectly constructed novels of all time. Perhaps its most astonishing achievement is to show not only the devastating effects of experience upon innocence but also the seriously alarming and equally destructive effects true innocence can have in a world of experience. Anna's sophistication and coolness make her no less vulnerable than the fifteen year-old... Read Full Review