The Forsyte Saga

by John Galsworthy

Other authorsAda Galsworthy (Introduction)

Hardcover, 1933

Collection

Description

Classic Literature. Fiction. HTML: John Galsworthy's The Forsyte Saga collects together three novels and two interludes, all published between 1906 and 1921. Not far removed from their farming history, the members of an upper-middle-class British family are painfully aware of being "new money". As a "man of property", Soames Forsyte's abilities bring him material wealth, but they grant him no quarter in the happiness stakes..

Library's rating

Rating

(361 ratings; 4.2)

Awards

Nobel Prize in Literature (1932)

BBC Culture - The 100 Greatest British Novels (91)

User reviews

LibraryThing member ursula

John Galsworthy's Forsyte Saga is made up of 3 novels and 2 short "interludes." The works concern themselves with the family dramas of the Forsyte clan, who we meet in the late 1800s in London. They are upper-class, but recently so, still feeling the sting of having a not-distant-enough ancestor

who was a farmer. Galsworthy frequently reminds the reader that the Forsytes are a type, not just an individual family. New money, and those most concerned about acquiring and keeping wealth and property are called "Forsytes," no matter what their name may be. Personally, I think the books would have benefited from less emphasis on that point, but I suppose it seemed like a good idea to have these reminders that the Forsytes were not alone in their attitudes and foibles.

The family stories are engaging, and each of the many Forsytes have their own distinct personalities, even as they're shaped by the times in which they live. The oldest generation ranges from the reclusive Timothy to the softened-by-age Old Jolyon, to the crotchety James. The middle generation is much different from their elders, both as a reflection of the change in attitudes brought about by the turn of the 20th century and as a reaction to their parents' values. Much of the substance of the series turns on members of the second generation - Soames, his wife Irene, and Young Jolyon in particular. But they also have their turn as the older generation as their children come of age and have ideas of their own about what's important in life. However, one can never really escape the past; some actions have effects that reverberate through the generations, however much one tries to ignore them and move on.

Although a long read, it was enjoyable and not difficult to follow at all. The family themes of love, duty, forgiveness, second chances, and propriety are set against the backdrop of changing times - not only the turn of the century, but the first World War, the Boer War, and the change of lifestyle brought on by the popularity of automobiles.

Recommended for: people who liked Pillars of the Earth or Edith Wharton's Age of Innocence, people who like to watch miniseries, Anglophiles.

Quote: "The persistence of the past is one of those tragi-comic blessings which each new age denies, coming cocksure on to the stage to mouth its claim to a perfect novelty."

Bonus quote: "This great and good woman, so highly thought of in ecclesiastical circles, was one of the principal priestesses in the temple of Forsyteism, keeping alive day and night a sacred flame to the God of Property, whose altar is inscribed with those inspiring words: 'Nothing for nothing, and really remarkably little for sixpence.'"

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LibraryThing member k8_not_kate

Although I dove into this hefty novel thinking it would be not much more than frothy Victorian scandal and romance, I was pleasantly surprised. Don't get me wrong--the scandal and romance is there, but it did have a bit more to offer than all that. Galsworthy manages to comment on the Victorian

British middle class (upper-middle class?) in a way that's still interesting to look in on. Also, the character Irene is expertly handled; we never hear her thoughts and feelings as we do all the other characters, yet she's more or less the center of the story. All the other characters (especially the male ones) revolve around this one person who the reader must size up without the benefit of being told her side of things. I would call the book very well written, if not a little over-the-top or dramatic at moments in terms of sentiment, although this is as much as I expected.

A plus for me personally, the novel spans something like 40 years and three generations; I'm truly a sucker for the epic story, be it in the form of literature or movies. The ambiance of the late Victorian era, WWI, and the beginning of the Jazz age are all covered, and Galsworthy relates them well. Furthermore, you really, really KNOW the characters when you're done. I was almost sad to leave Soames and the gang behind in the end.

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LibraryThing member Renz0808

"Was there anything, indeed, more tragic in the world than a man enslaved by his own possessive instinct, who couldn't see the sky for it, or even enter fully into what another person felt!" This has to be my favorite line of the whole book which was thought by young Jolyon Forsyte about his tragic

cousin Soames. It also sums up what the entire long family saga is about, possessions whether they are tangible or human. This book is so brilliant because it has a little bit of everything including family secrets, adultry, forbidden love, gambling, and scandal. It almost sounds like a soap opera but is only so much better. Another brillant part of the book is the fact that all the characters are so human none of them are perfect and each has their own set of flaws. At first I didn't think I was going to like the fact that there was no real hero but I have to say that it makes for some interesting reading. Another thing I liked about Galsworthy's writing of the book is that readers never really know what Irene is thinking, the only interpretations you get from her are what other characters give you. This makes her as elusive as she is described in the book. You either are going to love her or hate her. I found myself hating her at the beginning of the novel because I pitied poor Soames for receiving no love from her but by the time the interlude had occured, I found myself liking her more, especially because of her treatment of Old Jolyon. I started hating and piting Soames more and more, even his own daughter dislikes him. If you like LONG invloved novels with detailed descriptions about time and places you will love this book. It is really one of the great works of the 20th century and I think this author was way before his time. I look forward to reading the other two novels about the Forsyte family in he future.

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LibraryThing member thorold

This was the first of the three trilogies Galsworthy wrote about the eponymous family of successful upper middle class lawyers and businessmen, whom he uses to stand for a certain Victorian, English set of attitudes and values focused on the primacy of money, social position, respectability and

security.

The lawyer Soames Forsyte has a central position in all three novels: he’s an almost-perfect embodiment of Forsyteism, his idea of himself as a Man of Property invariably trumping any distant echoes of aesthetic sense or human feeling that get through to him. In the first novel we see his despotic possession of his wife Irene fall apart when she falls for the distinctly un-Forsyteish architect Philip; in the second we find him being pushed into a position where his desire for a child forces him into the ultimate sacrifice of respectability, a passage through the divorce court; and in the third he is pushed towards another major sacrifice of reputation for the sake of his daughter.

Galsworthy writes with a Trollope-like irony towards his characters (and a very Trollope-like fascination with legal quirks), but it’s informed by a 20th-century scepticism about Victorian values, written in the aftermath of the humiliation of South Africa and (in the last book) the horrors of the Great War. And a certain sense of nostalgia, too: when Timothy Forsyte, last of the Victorian generation, is interred in Highgate Cemetery, it’s a bit like the death of Emperor Franz-Joseph. Oddly, he doesn’t have anything to say about the Women’s Suffrage movement, but he does stress how Victorian law and custom were used to oppress women, and puts in his own plea for a long-overdue reform of divorce laws.

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LibraryThing member ReneH

One of the best books I ever read. It is very well written. It also is very, very English. The story has no flaws at all. Read this!

LibraryThing member DeltaQueen50

This version of The Forsyte Saga by John Galsworthy is over 800 pages and consists of 3 books; A Man of Property, In Chancery and To Let as well as 2 short interludes; Indian Summer and Awakening. This is a family saga about money, morals and class at the beginning of the 20th century. The Forsytes

are an upper-middle class family that have good expectations of improving their status. While the main focus of the story is on the disintegration of the marriage between Soames Forsyte and his wife, Irene, and the interactions between these two and their families, there are other plots involving this multi-generational family that revolve around the expansion of their wealth and the price paid for this obtainment.

I have to admit that by the third book I was quite tired of reading about Soames and Irene as well as their overdone “soap opera” plot. While Soames’ journey through life was difficult, I didn’t feel much sympathy for him as I found him quite pompous and rigid. At the same time, I found his wife, Irene too cold and distant to ever feel that I knew her so I couldn’t generate much interest in her story either. In the later books, I did like both Fleur and Jon, but it was easy to see what was going to happen with this relationship so I was never emotionally invested in their story.

Galsworthy spreads his story over a large canvas that includes all the various members of this family and we learn a little about each member over the course of the three books and many different sub-plots are developed along the way. Personally I much preferred these sub-plots that featured the other Forsytes and while I grew tired of some of the characters I can certainly attest to the appeal of this story with it’s descriptions of wealthy English lifestyles and conventional society morals at the turn on the century.

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LibraryThing member Kristelh

This is the story of the Forsytes of England during the Victorian, Edwardian, and post WWI years and specifically about Soames’ marriage to Irene and how it affects the whole family for several generations. It is an interesting look at a family but also about a historical time and changes that

occur. Changes in the roles of men and women, changes in transportation, changes in manners. This is a story which is mostly told through inner dialogue as the family has so many secrets and things they won’t talk about. The audio was well done. The narrator had a nice English accent and was able to give the characters their own voice.

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LibraryThing member julie10reads

John Galsworthy was born on August 14, 1867 in Surrey, England. Although more popular as a playwright during his lifetime, Galsworthy is now famous for his fiction masterpiece, The Forsyte Saga, which won him a Nobel prize for literature a year before his death in 1933. The saga traces the ups and

downs of the upper middle class Forsyte family from the end of the 19th century up until 1920 in a series of three novels and two “interludes”. Think Downton Abbey.

Did Nature permit a Forsyte not to make a slave of what he adored? Could beauty be confided to him?

Unlike Downton Abbey writer Julian Fellowes, John Galsworthy dissected the lives of the people of his own class. Galsworthy could not tolerate the obsession of his peers with buying and selling. The idea that one could “own” ineffables such as beauty and love, whether as art or a wife, was contemptible to him. He channelled his disgust into the creation of the odious but unforgettable Soames Forsyte, jealous husband of the beautiful Irene (pronounced in the Edwardian style: I-REE-nee). Galsworthy was clearly in love with the character of Irene, making her story of self-determination the unifying thread of the entire tapestry. Indeed it is hard to miss his empathy for women in this series.

The Forsyte Saga has been serialised twice on television, most recently and lavishly by Granada TV with Damian Lewis as Soames and the elegant Gina McKee as Irene. If the print format seems daunting at 912 pages (Oxford paperback), I highly recommend the audiobook narrated in a beautiful Edwardian drawl by Fred Williams.

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LibraryThing member amerynth

I thoroughly enjoyed John Galsworthy's "The Forsyte Chronicles." Best described as a Victorian soap opera, the book (which actually contains three novels and two short stories) follows several generations of the Forsyte family. Money, power, love and death are at the center of the story, as is the

changing landscape of London during the Victorian era.

A word of warning: There is a huge cast of characters in this book and they can be hard to keep track of at first. Don't use the family tree at the front of the book to do so... (even though it is wonderful.) Spoilers abound and I already knew the endings since I'd seen marriages listed in the family tree that were to come later on in the book.)

So glad I read this one... I enjoyed it enough that I plan to read the remainder of the series at some point.

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LibraryThing member jayne_charles

One of those turn-of-the-century novels that feels as though it was written much later. There is a lightness of touch, a preoccupation with interesting events and situations rather than flowery description. Soames is an excellent character; we first encounter him trying to 'look through his own

nose'. His difficult relationships with the various women in his life are fascinating. I can see why the TV series was so popula

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LibraryThing member xieouyang

I really enjoyed this novel. It has a very rich writing style. Rich in the use of language. Rich in the variety of characters and personalities and their interaction. Rich in the plot itself.

The novel traces the lives and travails of three generations of an English family residing in London at the

end of the 19th century through the first couple of decades in the 2oth. It's a story of a wealthy family embedded in the Victorian tradition that sees the transition to modernism among the younger generation. It has a vast number of characters, all family relations which makes it difficult, at the beginning, to keep track of who is who and who is related to whom. My copy has a very handy family tree that helped identify the characters and their relatioins.

Galsworthy does a great job in depicting the peronalities and emotions of the novel's characters. And they cover the whole range. Some of them are clearly dumb while other are very intelligent. Family and social tradition plays a key role for many of the characters, particularly the older generation. The younger generations, as it always the case, rebel and do not value those traditions necessarily, with dire results for the family.

I recommend reading this novel- but it requires some time because of it's length. It's entertaining throughout.

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LibraryThing member NinieB

About 40 years after watching the 1960s British television production, I finally have read this trilogy. I didn’t even remember the plot(s) properly. And I would never pretend to appreciate in depth the literary aspects. But the writing is a delight, the characters complex and fascinating. Just

outstanding.

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LibraryThing member hemlokgang

I just finished the book recently and have wanted to mull it over. I think this book is a genuine masterpiece because of Galsworthy's fabulous aiblity to reflect societal change in a single family tree. As society shifts, so do the Forsytes, at lest the newer generation at the time. Galsworthy's

character development is memorable. As with Dickens, there are certain characters who will live on in my memory, such as Irene, Soames, Timothy, and June, just to name a few. Galsworthy is able to adapt not only characters to the changing times but he adapts setting as well, changing sounds and smells to match the changes in the environment. I will always love the way Soames monitored and predicted the times through his assessment of art. Cold and calculating perhaps, yet prescient as well.

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LibraryThing member burritapal

If you despise the upper middle class as I do, with their tiresome entitlement, you will know why I gave this work five stars. Despite its sexist-ness (see page 595), and racist-ness (re: what the characters say about the time of the Boer war), it's still a delicious read.

LibraryThing member japaul22

I've been reading this 1000 page novel made up of three novels and 2 short interludes all month and I think I'm going to miss it now that its over. This book follows several generations of the Forsyte family, an upper middle class family in England the end of the 19th cent and through WWI. The

Forsytes and their characteristics become a metaphor for the whole upper middle class society.

The book revolves around the miserable marriage of Soames Forsyte to Irene. Soames treats Irene as his property, and with marriage laws being what they are at the time, in essence she is his property. Soames is possibly the most despicable character I've met in literature. Irene falls in love with a young architect and ends up escaping Soames. In the next book, Soames is back, wanting a child and needing Irene to comply or divorce him. She ends up falling in love with a different Forsyte and marrying him. In the third book, the children of Soames and Irene's subsequent marriages of course fall in love.

The plot seems soap opera-esque, but it's all so tastefully and artfully done, that it definitely reads like literature. Irene is a main character, but she's so passive that the story just happens around her. But there are strong women characters, like June and Holly, so the book doesn't fall into the annoying trap of no female characters. Soames is despicable, but so fleshed out through the book that he's understandable and therefore even more disgusting. I didn't love the last of the three parts because I found the relationship between the youngest Forsyte generation to be kind of annoying, but I was happy with the ending.

Overall, I loved the experience of reading this epic novel.

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LibraryThing member mahallett

921 pages and I didn't want it to end.

LibraryThing member hbergander

Young readers from nowadays will not have the time to consume the whole series of several novels. The first interlude “Indian Summer for a Forsythe” may be a good selection to receive an impression about Galsworthy’s clear style and his subtlety.

LibraryThing member brangwinn

A lovely long book. I am glad I finally read this classic. Following three generations of the Forsythe family it provides a look at genteel England from the mid 1800’s to after World War II. I’m still pondering if I am glad the book ended the way it did or another ending would have been

preferable. Whatever my opinion is, it is clear the the tight-knit clan was becoming less of an institution as it was replaced by more independent generations.

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LibraryThing member romanwoman

Classic novel of the emerging British middle class during the Victorian era. It examines the role of women, money, and obsession during Britain's empire era.

LibraryThing member CatieN

A social satire starring the Forsyte family. Excellent writing but a little hard to follow sometimes because of the number of characters and situations.

LibraryThing member jmoncton

The Forsyte Saga is the epic story that revolves around three generations of the Forsyte family, who have gone from being middle class tradesmen to a wealthy and powerful family. Although very fun for it's depiction of England and London society from the end of the Victorian period through the

Edwardian era, the series is a great story about passion, love, jealousy and the interplay between members of a family. The book is actually broken down into 3 novels with 2 short stories in between. Although I enjoyed the first story, 'A Man of Property', I wasn't completely hooked until the second story. Part of the difficulty is the enormous cast of characters. Although I wasn't sure who was who in the first story, by the end of the book, I knew all of their relationships and odd personality quirks. Definitely worth rereading just to enjoy the entire book.

I did a combination of reading and listening for this saga. I picked up the audio narration performed by Fred Williams. After the first 6 hours, I had to stop and switch to a narration by David Case. What a difference! Williams is basically just reading a very long book. Case performs the different voices of the characters and really captures much of the passion and feeling behind this emotional book.

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LibraryThing member dmarsh451

Drat. I see I lost the slip of paper where I write page numbers and the little notes for the book report. There are a few numbers scrawled on the inside back cover; page 785 has cricket, 808 the fixed idea, and there's a giant dog-ear folded from the bottom of the page. That would be a chapter I

want to read again. I put off finishing it too. The book was left untouched at page 830 for an entire month. Didn't want to finish it. I had been through too much with them, especially the unloveable Soames, and the houses; Robin Hill and Timothy's.

"His heart made a faint demonstration within him while he stood in full south sunlight on the newly whitened doorstep of that little house where four Forsytes had once lived, and now but one dwelt on like a winter fly; the house into which Soames had come and out of which he had gone times without number, divested of, or burdened with, fardels of family gossip; the house of the 'old people' of another century, another age."

That house.

The passage of time is strong in this book and Galsworthy's precision and wit so timeless, I can recognize in Soame's misgivings about motor cars my own dizzy suspicions about cellphones. Whether it's the 19th or 20th century that's turning, things only seem to go faster. This is not going back on the shelf. I'm tucking this dogeared beast under the bedside table so I can reread all my favourite parts.

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LibraryThing member JBarringer

This book starts out very slow. A snooty British family, wealthy elites but not aristocratic, more upper-middle class than upper-class, is having issues because one of the girls in the family is engaged to a young architect. The architect is hired to build a house for the girl's uncle, and winds up

having an affair with the uncle's young, pretty wife. The story starts out in the late 1800's and society is starting to change towards a world of expanded women's rights and a less rigid class structure, so while the older members of the Forsyte family react with the expected horror and disgust their class ought to feel for scandalous entanglements, the younger members of the family are not so convinced.
Over the next few years even more scandalous things happen, and at the same time the world around the Forsytes is changing more rapidly.
This was a long novel, and it felt long for the first 300-400pgs, but the second half was well paced and engaging. I liked the way this book explored how much society changed over the decades leading into WW1. This book was in fact first published just at the end of WW1, so the book's characters can have no real idea how much their world would be changing once the Great Depression and WW2 had their effects.

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