Status
Available
Call number
Genres
Collection
Publication
Oxford University Press, USA (1988), Edition: New edition, Paperback, 320 pages
Description
Midway of the Ponte Vecchio at Florence where three arches break the lines of the little jewellers' booths glittering on either hand and open an approach to the parapet Colville lounged against the corner of a shop and stared out upon the river.
User reviews
LibraryThing member Bjace
Theodore Colvill, newly and abruptly retired from two decades in the newspaper business, returns to Florence to begin the second act of his life. He meets an old friend and her stunning ward and blunders into a romance with the younger woman which becomes more and more difficult to sustain. Howells
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ventures into Henry James territory with a lighter touch, a less compelling style but a more realistic resolution. At the end of the story, his characters mouth the same sort of tortured-sensibility stuff that James writes, but then it alls slips away and the story ends happily and sensibly. I enjoyed it very much, but not much really happens and that got tedious toward the end. Show Less
LibraryThing member LauGal
I enjoyed this book. Indian Summer was abt 350 pages. I enjoyed the author's writing style and the story itself. Good character developement and good characters! I just felt this was longer than it needed to be.I plan to read other stories by this author.The ending was disappointing considering how
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the story started. He was a contemporary of Mark Twain. Show Less
LibraryThing member ToddSherman
Some great lines from the 1886 classic:
"Oh, how can you be yourself, and still be yourself?"
"His instinct of forbearance had served him better than the subtlest art. His submission was the best defense."
"She dropped on her knees beside her bed, and stretched out her arms upon it, an image of that
Maturity dallies with inexperience and youth and comes out stronger and more sure of itself on the other side. No passages of easy advantage, ripping spring flowers from trees, justifying existence by rubbing the soft skin of initial bloom with calloused fingers. The sickening cliché of the older man with the younger woman gets a far more even-eyed, verdancy-after-final-frost kind of treatment
"Oh, how can you be yourself, and still be yourself?"
"His instinct of forbearance had served him better than the subtlest art. His submission was the best defense."
"She dropped on her knees beside her bed, and stretched out her arms upon it, an image of that
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desolation of soul which, when we are young, seems limitless, but which in later life we know has comparatively narrow bounds beyond the clouds that rest so blackly around us."Maturity dallies with inexperience and youth and comes out stronger and more sure of itself on the other side. No passages of easy advantage, ripping spring flowers from trees, justifying existence by rubbing the soft skin of initial bloom with calloused fingers. The sickening cliché of the older man with the younger woman gets a far more even-eyed, verdancy-after-final-frost kind of treatment
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LibraryThing member JBD1
My first Howells novel, and sure, I'd probably read another one or two. Perhaps not the most terribly exciting book, and the characters are nowhere near as interesting or well-drawn as those of Trollope (for example). But it held my attention just fine, for the most part.
Subjects
Language
Original language
English
Original publication date
1886
Physical description
320 p.; 7.31 inches
ISBN
0192817930 / 9780192817938