Howard Belsey, a Rembrandt scholar who doesn't like Rembrandt, is an Englishman abroad and a long-suffering professor at Wellington, a liberal New England arts college. He has been married for thirty years to Kiki, an American woman who no longer resembles the sexy activist she once was. Their three children passionately pursue their own paths: Levi quests after authentic black...
Howard Belsey, a Rembrandt scholar who doesn't like Rembrandt, is an Englishman abroad and a long-suffering professor at Wellington, a liberal New England arts college. He has been married for thirty years to Kiki, an American woman who no longer resembles the sexy activist she once was. Their three children passionately pursue their own paths: Levi quests after authentic blackness, Zora believes that intellectuals can redeem everybody, and Jerome struggles to be a believer in a family of strict atheists. Faced with the oppressive enthusiasms of his children, Howard feels that the first two acts of his life are over and he has no clear plans for the finale. Or the encore.
Then Jerome, Howard's older son, falls for Victoria, the stunning daughter of the right-wing icon Monty Kipps, and the two families find themselves thrown together in a beautiful corner of America, enacting a cultural and personal war against the background of real wars that they barely register. An infidelity, a death, and a legacy set in motion a chain of events that sees all parties forced to examine the unarticulated assumptions which underpin their lives. How do you choose the work on which to spend your life? Why do you love the people you love? Do you really believe what you claim to? And what is the beautiful thing, and how far will you go to get it?
Set on both sides of the Atlantic, Zadie Smith's third novel is a brilliant analysis of family life, the institution of marriage, intersections of the personal and political, and an honest look at people's deceptions. It is also, as you might expect, very funny indeed.
everything i do i do with my body. even my soul is made up of raw meat, flesh. truth is in a face, as much as it is anywhere. we women know that faces are full of meaning, I think. Men have the gift of pretending that's not true. And this is where their power comes from. (查看原文)
Zadie Smith has played her On Beauty as a comic satire. She has presented many aspects of the ugliness in human beings and laughed at people’s blindness towards the nature of beauty. One major issue in the novel is Howard’s mid-life crisis. He has an aff...
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扎迪·史密斯 作者
btr
人民文学出版社2008版
唐瞬
上海译文出版社2016版
snow
Penguin2006版
0 有用 飞州猫岛 2024-01-18 02:40:35 上海
高中某一年暑假文学课作业，硬着头皮读的，只记得又臭又长了
0 有用 - 2024-12-30 18:11:20 上海
我对这本书的感受很复杂。五分之一左右我觉得渐入佳境，是非常熟悉的well educated作者写的那种小说。到Carlene的出现，她与kiki的联结展开，这部分是我最喜欢的。作者对这个角色的描写并不算多，但那一场没来得及实现的，两个为家庭牺牲了自己的女人约定好的外出，非常动人。但情节急转直下，我没想到她的退场这么早，本来能更深入的友谊也就此被斩断。男性角色我没有太多想说的……年长的基本都是伪君子... 我对这本书的感受很复杂。五分之一左右我觉得渐入佳境，是非常熟悉的well educated作者写的那种小说。到Carlene的出现，她与kiki的联结展开，这部分是我最喜欢的。作者对这个角色的描写并不算多，但那一场没来得及实现的，两个为家庭牺牲了自己的女人约定好的外出，非常动人。但情节急转直下，我没想到她的退场这么早，本来能更深入的友谊也就此被斩断。男性角色我没有太多想说的……年长的基本都是伪君子。作者能让zora看清自己父亲我倒是有点惊讶，因为这种中产daddy’s girl还挺经典的。kipps一家我真的觉得挺讨厌的，尤其是不尊重Carlene的意愿，还恶意揣测kiki。vee没有太多立体度，倒有点刻板。Carlene不在之后我都草草看完的，结尾处理的还不错，特别是kiki的醒悟与选择。 (展开)
0 有用 今日早睡 2025-03-05 16:15:53 英国
不要对主角做道德评断我支持但这本书的男主真是看得有点冒火。男中年知识分子就这么烦人惟妙惟肖啊惟妙惟肖。
0 有用 hierophant 2020-03-16 09:36:11
【2016-17】写得非常聪明，Nick Laird那首诗太好了。
1 有用 seren 2006-05-08 22:58:22
这么厚一本啃完了，实在是有成就感得要死啊，有成就感得上升为幸福感了怎么办。。。