HomeGroupsTalkMoreZeitgeist
Search Site
This site uses cookies to deliver our services, improve performance, for analytics, and (if not signed in) for advertising. By using LibraryThing you acknowledge that you have read and understand our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. Your use of the site and services is subject to these policies and terms.

Results from Google Books

Click on a thumbnail to go to Google Books.

The Great Man: A Novel by Kate Christensen
Loading...

The Great Man: A Novel (original 2007; edition 2007)

by Kate Christensen

MembersReviewsPopularityAverage ratingMentions
4852750,753 (3.49)25
National Bestseller and Winner of the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction Oscar Feldman, the renowned figurative painter, has passed away. As his obituary notes, Oscar is survived by his wife, Abigail, their son, Ethan, and his sister, the well-known abstract painter Maxine Feldman. What the obituary does not note, however, is that Oscar is also survived by his longtime mistress, Teddy St. Cloud, and their daughters. As two biographers interview the women in an attempt to set the record straight, the open secret of his affair reaches a boiling point and a devastating skeleton threatens to come to light. From the acclaimed author of The Epicure's Lament, a scintillating novel of secrets, love, and legacy in the New York art world. "Mischievous...funny, astute...As unexpectedly generous as it is entertaining.... Christensen is a witty observer of the art universe." --The New York Times… (more)
Member:lisapeet
Title:The Great Man: A Novel
Authors:Kate Christensen
Info:Doubleday (2007), Edition: First Edition, Hardcover, 320 pages
Collections:Currently reading, Read, Library book, Your library, eBook, Galley/ARC
Rating:
Tags:None

Work Information

The Great Man by Kate Christensen (2007)

Loading...

Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book.

No current Talk conversations about this book.

» See also 25 mentions

Showing 1-5 of 27 (next | show all)
Here's what I wrote in 2010 about this read: "OK, but an easy read. Those old gals still are kicking it up!' ( )
  MGADMJK | Aug 17, 2023 |
A rare and refreshing novel featuring vivid, well-drawn characters in their 70s & 80s.
An engaging page-turner, sharply rendered. ( )
  dcmr | Jul 4, 2017 |
I loved Kate Christensen's The Great Man, a graceful, smart and character-driven novel set in motion by the death of a renowned artist. The characters are the great man's widow and autistic son, his paramour (and mother of his two daughters), his sister (and fellow stellar artist), and others whose lifelong orbits around the titular character begin to decay rapidly away from the weaker gravity of his memory. In the resulting chaos there are collisions and near-misses and certainly damage is done. But when a dark secret about one of The Great Man's most famous works is revealed, it sparks a realignment of those other bodies into a new configuration that just might work. Spot-on dialogue, wonderful sense of place, lovely insights into what makes human life so interesting. ( )
  jimnicol | Feb 21, 2017 |
Really good fun. ( )
  laurenbufferd | Nov 14, 2016 |
Kate Christensen is a very thorough writer, and fills each character with a plethora of good and bad qualities. This book was fantastic, and I highly recommend this and the Epicure's Lament (I've been unable to find any of her other books at the library, sadly.) ( )
  arpentec | Nov 27, 2015 |
Showing 1-5 of 27 (next | show all)
no reviews | add a review
You must log in to edit Common Knowledge data.
For more help see the Common Knowledge help page.
Canonical title
Original title
Alternative titles
Original publication date
People/Characters
Important places
Important events
Related movies
Epigraph
Perhaps being old is having lightened rooms
Inside your head, and people in them, acting
People you know, yet can't quite name; each looms
Like a deep loss restored, from known doors turning,
Setting down a lamp, smiling from a stair, extracting
A known book from the shelves; or sometimes only
The rooms themselves, chairs and a fire burning,
The blown bush at the window, or the sun's
Faint friendliness on the wall some lonely
Rain-ceased midsummer evening. There is where they live:
Not hear and now, but where all happened once.

- Philip Larkin, "The Old Fools"
Dedication
For Lizzie
First words
"It's amazing how well you can live on very little money," said Teddy St. Cloud to Henry Burke over her shoulder as she strode into the kitchen of her Brooklyn row house.
Quotations
Last words
(Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)
Disambiguation notice
Publisher's editors
Blurbers
Original language
Information from the German Common Knowledge. Edit to localize it to your language.
Canonical DDC/MDS
Canonical LCC

References to this work on external resources.

Wikipedia in English (2)

National Bestseller and Winner of the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction Oscar Feldman, the renowned figurative painter, has passed away. As his obituary notes, Oscar is survived by his wife, Abigail, their son, Ethan, and his sister, the well-known abstract painter Maxine Feldman. What the obituary does not note, however, is that Oscar is also survived by his longtime mistress, Teddy St. Cloud, and their daughters. As two biographers interview the women in an attempt to set the record straight, the open secret of his affair reaches a boiling point and a devastating skeleton threatens to come to light. From the acclaimed author of The Epicure's Lament, a scintillating novel of secrets, love, and legacy in the New York art world. "Mischievous...funny, astute...As unexpectedly generous as it is entertaining.... Christensen is a witty observer of the art universe." --The New York Times

No library descriptions found.

Book description
Oscar Feldman, the renowned figurative painter, has passed away. As his obituary notes, Oscar is survived by his wife, Abigail, their son, Ethan, and his sister, the well-known abstract painter Maxine Feldman. What the obituary does not note, however, is that Oscar is also survived by his longtime mistress, Teddy St. Cloud, and their daughters.

As two biographers interview the women in an attempt to set the record straight, the open secret of his affair reaches a boiling point and a devastating skeleton threatens to come to light. From the acclaimed author of The Epicure's Lament, a scintillating novel of secrets, love, and legacy in the New York art world.
Haiku summary

Current Discussions

None

Popular covers

Quick Links

Rating

Average: (3.49)
0.5 1
1 2
1.5
2 10
2.5 5
3 36
3.5 8
4 40
4.5 2
5 15

Is this you?

Become a LibraryThing Author.

 

About | Contact | Privacy/Terms | Help/FAQs | Blog | Store | APIs | TinyCat | Legacy Libraries | Early Reviewers | Common Knowledge | 204,818,050 books! | Top bar: Always visible