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Loading... The Sorrows of an American (2008)by Siri Hustvedt
In all honesty, the only reason why I really like this book is because the characters go on long rambling streaks about philosophers and Freud. (  )1   irunfrombears | Sep 7, 2010 |  This story works on so many levels that I found myself wondering about it even when I wasn't reading. She touches on so many variants on the theme of loss in this book: the loss of the narrator's father is the backdrop but there is also loss of memory through old age and mental illness, loss of social status, financial loss, even loss of consciousness. With such a focus it could have been a very bleak book indeed, (the delightful Eggy offers much needed light amid the shade) but Hustvedt creates something wonderfully positive here, as her narrator grieves, stumbles and recovers his emotional balance. There is much more here to enjoy, I could go on, but instead I will simply urge you to discover this book for yourself. (  )1 cherry_red186 | Aug 25, 2010 |  This review was written for LibraryThing Early Reviewers. bkbarons | May 3, 2010 | I believe this is close to a masterpiece and my only real criticism is that it is sometimes too clever for its own good. Hustvedt lets us get under her characters' skin in a way that make them close family while you read. The novel has a slow start, and it continues to thread forward slowly, but after the first third you get used to it and want it no other way. Again she has chosen a male character as her main character, and as a man I am in awe of how well Hustvedt understands us. She seems to say that everything is connected to everything, both in space and in time. At the very end she gives us the clue to the book, what we have known all along, that it is about reincarnation, "not after death, but here when we're alive." Along the way she presents us with a brilliantly researched book about psychoanalysis, Norwegian-Americans, father-son relationships, Jamaica, lovers vs. fuck buddies, rural America vs New York. ( )1 petterw | Jan 28, 2010 | A psychoanalyst delves into his own mental well being as he traces the influences in his life, examines is father's life and refers to the patients he has ndealt with. (  ) jumpingjacks | Jan 22, 2010 |
 The Sorrows of an American is Siri Hustvedt's fourth novel. It was first published in 2008 and is about a Norwegian American family and their troubles. The novel is partly autobiographical in that Hustvedt herself is of Norwegian descent and in that passages from her own deceased father's journal about the Depression in America and the Pacific theatre of war during World War II are scattered through the book. The Sorrows of an American operates on several time levels and depicts the difficult times of four generations of the fictional Davidsen family. At the core of the novel lies a long-kept family secret which the first person narrator, a middle-aged psychiatrist called Erik Davidsen who lives and works in New York, sets out to unearth together with his sister. However, the novel abounds in subplots which focus on the present rather than the past.
Amazon.com Product Description (ISBN 0312428200, Paperback)When Erik Davidsen and his sister, Inga, find a disturbing note among their late father's papers, they believe he may be implicated in a mysterious death. The Sorrows of an American tells the story of the Davidsen family as brother and sister unbandage its wounds in the year following their father’s funeral. Erik is a psychiatrist dangerously vulnerable to his patients; Inga is a writer whose late husband, a famous novelist, seems to have concealed a secret life. Interwoven with each new mystery in their lives are discoveries about their father’s youth--poverty, the War, the Depression--that bring new implications to his relationship with his children. (retrieved from Amazon Thu, 14 Feb 2013 13:40:55 -0500) When Erik Davidsen and his sister, Inga, find a disturbing note from an unknown woman among their dead father's papers, they believe he may be implicated in a mysterious death. The Sorrows of an American tells the story of the Davidsen family as brother and sister uncover its secrets and unbandage its wounds in the year following their father's funeral.… (more) |
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