Status
Available
Call number
Collection
Publication
Vintage (1989), Paperback, 176 pages
Description
A wonderful story of questioning, disillusionment, and conversion, "Where Angels Fear to Tread" tells the story of a prim English family's encounter with the foreign land of Italy. When attractive, impulsive English widow Lilia marries Gino, a dashing and highly unsuitable Italian twelve years her junior, her snobbish former in-laws make no attempts to hide their disapproval. But their expedition to face the uncouth foreigner takes an unexpected turn when they return to Italy under tragic circumstances intending to rescue Lilia and Gino's baby.
User reviews
LibraryThing member Cariola
While this novel won't be among my favorite of Forster's, I did appreciate it as a precursor to such masterpieces as A Room wiht a View, Howard's End and A Passage to India. Widow Lilia Herriton, aged 33, decides to spend a year in Italy with a female companion, leaving her young daughter with her
It's at this point that the novel falls into a hazy category where I would also place Chekhov's play The Seagull. Is it comedy, tragedy, or melodrama? Or perhaps a combination of all three? While generally categorized as comedies (most likely because of their sharp social critiques), characters in both works endure some truly tragic events--and respond quite melodramatically. This fuzziness of genre doesn't really detract from either the play or the novel but does leave one wondering what the author's original intention might have been, and whether he might have gone a bit off track.
So my recommendation is: If you've never read Forster before, don't start here; but if you have, Where Angels Fear to Tread is worth adding to your TBR shelf.
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mother-in-law. When the family learns that she has become engaged to a younger Italian--the son of a dentist, God forbid!--Philip Herriton is hustled off to persuade her to return. Alas, he is too late; the couple is already married, and passion seems to have prevailed over middle-class British stodginess and propriety. Sadly, things don't work out well for Lilia, as her romantic ideals don't mesh with the reality of Italian married life. After she dies in childbirth, Philip is sent on a second mission: to 'rescue' Lilia's child and bring it back into the fold of British respectability.It's at this point that the novel falls into a hazy category where I would also place Chekhov's play The Seagull. Is it comedy, tragedy, or melodrama? Or perhaps a combination of all three? While generally categorized as comedies (most likely because of their sharp social critiques), characters in both works endure some truly tragic events--and respond quite melodramatically. This fuzziness of genre doesn't really detract from either the play or the novel but does leave one wondering what the author's original intention might have been, and whether he might have gone a bit off track.
So my recommendation is: If you've never read Forster before, don't start here; but if you have, Where Angels Fear to Tread is worth adding to your TBR shelf.
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LibraryThing member jeffome
Another unexpectedly quick read that i enjoyed beyond my expectation. Not that i had any right to an expectation.....I just reached for this thin volume out of my rather large library, and began to read.....i did not even read the cover. Of course, a title always seems to subconsciously create a
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brief sense in my brain as to what i may be about to read......and as is usually the case, that sense was nowhere near accurate. It was quirky and subtly humorous, although the topics were not always so......several of the characters were rather unpleasant, or tedious at the least.......some had obsessions about 'proper appearances' to guide their 'moral' compass......& others seemed to care not at all about things they should. This in essence is a struggle of expected duty vs. genuine human connection.......and all is not light and fun. Unexpected tragedy drops in several times to further stir this tale. The ending was not totally unexpected.....but what got it there was very unexpected! This particular volume had notes from the editor (which i always read after the book because they always contain spoilers!!!!), and i am always glad to learn how these works came to be from knowledgeable sources. I've only read a volume of Forster's short stories up until now, which i do not believe inspired me as much as this, but i will be looking forward to his remaining books on my shelf. Show Less
LibraryThing member TheAmpersand
Even considering that a couple of E.M. Forster's books are considered to be flat-out twentieth century classics, "Where Angels Fear to Tread" is a remarkable performance, a debut novella that never seems to put a foot wrong. The book works on a number of levels. It's an acid satire of comfortable
What really struck me about "Where Angels Fear to Tread" is how well I felt I knew the characters after spending a mere one hundred and sixty pages with them. Although I've seen Forster's style described as "light," he had the rare gift of describing character: his insight into people's characters and their motivations seems, at times, nothing short of supernatural. The book itself may be brief, but -- from the clever but ineffectual Phillip to the reckless Lilia to the louche but undeniably charming Gino, each of his characters seem to breathe on the page. The changes they undergo -- their character arcs, if you'll permit me the phrase -- also seem significant and complex for such a short book. Forster, in other words, fit a lot of humanity into this little volume.
Lastly, while it's been a while since I've picked up anything by this author, "Where Angels Fear to Tread" seemed to confirm my suspicions that he serves as an important link between nineteenth and twentieth century writing. He writes exclusively in the third person and doesn't hesitate to describe a reader's character or moral precepts to his readers, which may not be to every modern reader's taste. Still, while these descriptions are often remarkably insightful and economical, I felt that something else was constantly trying to emerge here. Forster doesn't hesitate to describe the lazy, likeable, pleasure-seeking Gino in forthrightly physical, almost erotic, terms. Italy itself, with its opera performances and its food and its cafés and its warm, scented night breezes, is portrayed as a garden of sensual delights, something that often disorients our English visitors and makes them question their own values and customs. The body, in all its messy, sensual glory, keeps trying to break through here, and sometimes it does. In "Where Angels Fear to Tread," threadbare Victorian morality constantly seems as risk of toppling over once and for all, and it's sometimes thrilling to watch. I'm not sure if this one is read as often as Forster's "A Passage to India" or his "A Room with a View," but honestly, I can't see why it shouldn't be. Highly recommended.
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upper-class British life at Sawston -- apparently Tunbridge Wells -- transposed to an Italian setting. Skewering the manners and manias of the economically comfortable is never all that difficult, but his upper-class would-be rebels aren't necessarily heroes. They may complain about the dreadfully dull culture of the moneyed upper classes, but lack the fortitude to leave it behind entirely. Being Forster, this little book is splendidly observan about character: about what makes some people strong or weak, about which of our connections are really most meaningful to us, about and which values really help us develop. And although Forster didn't know too many Italians personally when he wrote this one, it's a not-too-unsuccessful study in the contrast between Southern European and Northern European attitudes, and, perhaps most delightfully, its a canvas on which the author can describe -- and express his own enthusiasm for -- Italy. Even if it had nothing else to recommend it, "Where Angels Fear to Tread" would be worth reading just for the author's descriptions of Italy's natural beauty, its ancient towns, and its complex social customs that, to a visiting Englishman, must have seemed delightfully novel and strange. You can't fake the sort of enthusiasm that Forster displays here.What really struck me about "Where Angels Fear to Tread" is how well I felt I knew the characters after spending a mere one hundred and sixty pages with them. Although I've seen Forster's style described as "light," he had the rare gift of describing character: his insight into people's characters and their motivations seems, at times, nothing short of supernatural. The book itself may be brief, but -- from the clever but ineffectual Phillip to the reckless Lilia to the louche but undeniably charming Gino, each of his characters seem to breathe on the page. The changes they undergo -- their character arcs, if you'll permit me the phrase -- also seem significant and complex for such a short book. Forster, in other words, fit a lot of humanity into this little volume.
Lastly, while it's been a while since I've picked up anything by this author, "Where Angels Fear to Tread" seemed to confirm my suspicions that he serves as an important link between nineteenth and twentieth century writing. He writes exclusively in the third person and doesn't hesitate to describe a reader's character or moral precepts to his readers, which may not be to every modern reader's taste. Still, while these descriptions are often remarkably insightful and economical, I felt that something else was constantly trying to emerge here. Forster doesn't hesitate to describe the lazy, likeable, pleasure-seeking Gino in forthrightly physical, almost erotic, terms. Italy itself, with its opera performances and its food and its cafés and its warm, scented night breezes, is portrayed as a garden of sensual delights, something that often disorients our English visitors and makes them question their own values and customs. The body, in all its messy, sensual glory, keeps trying to break through here, and sometimes it does. In "Where Angels Fear to Tread," threadbare Victorian morality constantly seems as risk of toppling over once and for all, and it's sometimes thrilling to watch. I'm not sure if this one is read as often as Forster's "A Passage to India" or his "A Room with a View," but honestly, I can't see why it shouldn't be. Highly recommended.
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LibraryThing member ctpress
I loved Room With a View and Howards End. My expectations were high but the book did not come close to the other two masterpieces. There were no persons to like in this tale - it left me cold and indifferent - couldn't wait for the italien wailing and the english prudishness to end.
LibraryThing member laudemgloriae
Forster is my favorite novelist, and I can not articulate how much I love this book. It is stunning how he expresses the need of his characters for each other, and their fear of needing eachother... that they are 'angels' who 'fear to tread' amongst each other... It's timeless.
LibraryThing member wrmjr66
This slim volume shows Forster's typical concerns with English society values when placed in awkward situations. However, the characters are thin representations of types rather than fully drawn, and this detracts greatly from the book's success. The villain (if there is one) is scarcely portrayed
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at all. The hero (again, a debatable term) seems inconstant to an extreme, while the important minor characters have almost no personality. Perhaps the prefix to his title, "Fools rush in," is meant to characterize all of the people in the novel, but I don't think that is quite accurate either. Fortunately, the book has its beautifully written sections and some nice social satire. Still, the novel is nowhere near Forster's best. If you love his other work, you may like this novel, but if you are looking for an introduction, turn to A Passage to India or Howard's End instead. Show Less
LibraryThing member Helenliz
This is such an odd book I'm not sure I know where to start. It feels veryt stilted and Victorian, with the family, society and appearances taking such a high profile in the behaviour of the English people depicted. Lilian marries into the Herriot family, and is not approved of. After she is left a
It had some beautiful descriptions and some really joyful passages, but the overwhelming effect was of constriction tot he point of claustophobia. I'm very glad I'm not a Victorian.
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widow, she goes to Italy and falls in love. At which point, her former husband's brother is sent out to sort things out. He is destined to fail, being unable to undertsand either of them. From here, events take a turn for the worse and the stuck up Victorian attitudes of the family, comerned more with the appearance of good than of actually doing good mean that this ends up being a sorry tale. It almost comes to murder apart from the interference of a woman who comes into her own and sees the disctintion between looking good and doing good. It all ends up ina bot of a farce, with misplaced affections all over the place. I couldn;t help thinking that this could have had a very different outcome at any number of points, but I think that's the point, society's expectations were so conditioning that it would have taken a fool or a very brave person to have stepped in and crossed that line of expected behaviour. It had some beautiful descriptions and some really joyful passages, but the overwhelming effect was of constriction tot he point of claustophobia. I'm very glad I'm not a Victorian.
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LibraryThing member soylentgreen23
Forster was a young man when he wrote this, his first novel, and yet it turned out to be a remarkably mature piece of fiction, examining as it does the battle of class consciences that was a common feature of British society of his day. His descriptions of the Italian countryside and its people are
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witty as well as vivid, and much better than so many others that I have read. Show Less
LibraryThing member amerynth
"Where Angels Fear to Tread" is E.M. Forster's first novel and it shows. It really isn't a bad book -- it just isn't quite up to the standard set by his other, more famous novels.
The story starts with Lilia, a young widow who travels to Italy for a year-long break and falls in love with a youthful
Forster's writing is great, but the story doesn't really gel in the end... the ending seemed a bit forced. I might have enjoyed this one more if I wasn't familiar with his later works.
The story starts with Lilia, a young widow who travels to Italy for a year-long break and falls in love with a youthful
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Italian, much to the dismay of her inlaws. As in his later novels, Forster skewers the class system and the exportation of the British way of life, just not has effectively as he does in his later works.Forster's writing is great, but the story doesn't really gel in the end... the ending seemed a bit forced. I might have enjoyed this one more if I wasn't familiar with his later works.
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LibraryThing member hscherry
Slow starting, but eventually got into it & quite enjoyed it in the end. A little unbelievable, but quite sweet.
LibraryThing member gypsysmom
On the back cover this book is called a "sophisticated comedy" so I expected something witty something like Noel Coward's Private Lives. It wasn't even close to what I expected. Yes, there were some funny parts but, on the whole, I found it rather gruesome. Without spoiling the end for another
Forster is quite savage about the middle class English and their pretensions and that seems to be the point of this book. Lilia, youngish widow of Charles Herriton, decides to travel in Italy with a companion for a year. While in the small city of Monteriano she falls in love with a handsome, unemployed Italian and they get engaged. When the Herritons hear this news her brother-in-law, Phillip, is sent off to prevent the marriage. However, he is too late and the marriage has already taken place. Lilia lives to regret her hasty marriage to Gino who carries on his life as he had before he was married, spending most of his time away from the marital home, but forbidding Lilia to go out unaccompanied. Then Lilia discovers he has had an affair and when Gino gets angry that she went out of the house she "saw him for a cruel, worthless, hypocritical, dissolute upstart" (p. 82) She responds by telling him she knows about the affair. Gino doesn't deny it; instead he laughs and realizes he must give her more credit than he has been. He thinks he can gloss everything over with a little more attention but Lilia will not be placated so easily. Lilia writes to a male friend in England to ask him to rescue her but Gino intercepts the letter. Lilia becomes pregnant and dies in childbirth.
That's one of the main problems I have with this book. Lilia is independently wealthy; she knows how to get out of Monteriano; even if she didn't want to return to her in-laws she has her own mother's place in Yorkshire. It just doesn't seem likely to me that she would meekly sit around Monteriano when she is miserable.
As a study of the contrasts between the staid English and the passionate Italians this book is probably a masterpiece. No doubt it shook people up when it was first published. Now, however, it seems dated.
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reader I can't specify why I didn't like it. I found a scholarly review of the book which you can read if you don't mind having the end spoiled.Forster is quite savage about the middle class English and their pretensions and that seems to be the point of this book. Lilia, youngish widow of Charles Herriton, decides to travel in Italy with a companion for a year. While in the small city of Monteriano she falls in love with a handsome, unemployed Italian and they get engaged. When the Herritons hear this news her brother-in-law, Phillip, is sent off to prevent the marriage. However, he is too late and the marriage has already taken place. Lilia lives to regret her hasty marriage to Gino who carries on his life as he had before he was married, spending most of his time away from the marital home, but forbidding Lilia to go out unaccompanied. Then Lilia discovers he has had an affair and when Gino gets angry that she went out of the house she "saw him for a cruel, worthless, hypocritical, dissolute upstart" (p. 82) She responds by telling him she knows about the affair. Gino doesn't deny it; instead he laughs and realizes he must give her more credit than he has been. He thinks he can gloss everything over with a little more attention but Lilia will not be placated so easily. Lilia writes to a male friend in England to ask him to rescue her but Gino intercepts the letter. Lilia becomes pregnant and dies in childbirth.
That's one of the main problems I have with this book. Lilia is independently wealthy; she knows how to get out of Monteriano; even if she didn't want to return to her in-laws she has her own mother's place in Yorkshire. It just doesn't seem likely to me that she would meekly sit around Monteriano when she is miserable.
As a study of the contrasts between the staid English and the passionate Italians this book is probably a masterpiece. No doubt it shook people up when it was first published. Now, however, it seems dated.
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LibraryThing member ImBookingIt
There is a reason this is his least known work-- not very memorable.
LibraryThing member murraymint11
A quick read. Full of unlikeable characters, I never really got into the book. Descriptions of Italy were very familiar though :)
LibraryThing member li33ieg
I can't believe how long it took me to discover EM Foster! Having done so, I've gotten through more or less his complete works in less than six months and am recommending him to my daughter who, at the age of 16, seems to me ready to take on more adult reading but struggles a bit with certain
Forster looks at how human society operates to support certain individuals it collectively approves of and to correct (if it doesn't go so far as to bring down) those it disapproves of.
As relevent today as ever he was.
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'classics' where the themes appear inaccessible to one so young.Forster looks at how human society operates to support certain individuals it collectively approves of and to correct (if it doesn't go so far as to bring down) those it disapproves of.
As relevent today as ever he was.
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LibraryThing member sometimeunderwater
Read this and 'A Room with a View' in quick succession. This is definitely the deeper, and more tragic of the two. Some of the characterisation is a little pantomime-villain, particularly the mother and Harriet (at first, until she becomes simply mad), but captures the Italian spirit well. Lilia
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gets a bum deal. Show Less
LibraryThing member AllieW
If you have ever felt frustrated by the petty vagaries of human behaviour, or the idiocy of certain societal taboos or customs, then you will warm to Forster's theme at once. In a mere 142 pages, he deftly exposes the class-ridden snobbery of the English society of his time, and the racism with
The novel is a wonderful evocation of the minutiae of family bickering and arguments which are still relevant and highly recognisable today. (The bullying mother and slightly too weak, compliant son, for example). Analysis of the way that society represses the individual and the conflict between what you want to do and what society expects of you was to become a recurring theme in his novels.
His title is taken from Pope's 'An Essay on criticism' (1711), where the full line is `For fools rush in where angels fear to tread'. Indeed, most of the characters who people this perceptive novel appear foolish in the extreme, especially to our early twenty-first century eyes. For example, one could consider the headstrong and impulsive Lilia, packed off to Italy for a year with a chaperone by her husband's family in the hope that she will return 'not quite so vulgar' one of these rushing fools. Certainly her meeting and marriage of the unemployed (and son of a dentist, shock horror!) Gino within the space of a mere three weeks, in complete disregard for her nine-year old daughter, or first husband's family may be counted foolish, particularly by the standards of the time. Expecially when the tragic outcome of that decision is made clear. Despite her flaws, though, one cannot help but admire her for her courage in rebelling against and challenging the status quo - the status quo which appears to imprison so many in Edwardian English society.
However, what about the rest of the cast of this insightful and oh-so-English novel? There is Mrs Herriton Senior, for a start. A woman so caught up with herself and the requirements of 'society' that she sends her son and daughter off on what may very well be thought of as a fool's errand to collect the child of Lilia's fateful second marriage by whatever means possible - paying Gino off, if necessary. Her evident hypocrisy and cruelty appears to be indicative of that of society as a whole. And they, Philip and Harriet, in their turn, may also be considered foolish, or at the very least weak, when they meekly comply with her requirements. (Although, as they have been under her thumb their whole lives, perhaps it is understandable).
This tragic novel (and Forster is a master tragedian) has some happy moments, however. The opera scene is a complete joy and very funny. Here, Caroline helps Philip to discover happiness, and he begins to fall in love with her. Also quite wonderful are Forster's beautiful descriptions of Italy, reflecting his deep love for the country. Indeed, as Oliver Stallybrass points out in his informative introduction, this book is, in part, based on his own trip to Milan. The line 'it was an irritable couple who took tickets to Monteriano' is almost an exact replica of one from Forster's journal, where the destination was, instead, Milan, and where it had been preceded by an equally unfortunate and tiresome catelogue of events. Perhaps, therefore, there is something of Edward Morgan Forster in the character of Philip, who, although weak and equally tainted by his family's snobbery, one cannot help but like. (Indeed, he lost his father when very young, and was likewise brought up in the world of women). Sadly, Harriet's impatience brings about the sorrowful end to this poignant novel - and all are left to think on its meaning.
All in all, this novel embodies the description of Forster's work made on the Forster questionnaire webpage 'concise, but rich'. Taste and see!
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which it appears to be inevitably coupled - a product, no doubt of the colonialism and imperialism from which we have yet, still, to recover. That this stains the beauty of quintessential Englishness is perhaps one reason for Forster's love-hate relationship for England and the fact that he spent so much of his time abroad (the taboo which he struggled with, and felt persecuted for, being his homosexuality). The novel is a wonderful evocation of the minutiae of family bickering and arguments which are still relevant and highly recognisable today. (The bullying mother and slightly too weak, compliant son, for example). Analysis of the way that society represses the individual and the conflict between what you want to do and what society expects of you was to become a recurring theme in his novels.
His title is taken from Pope's 'An Essay on criticism' (1711), where the full line is `For fools rush in where angels fear to tread'. Indeed, most of the characters who people this perceptive novel appear foolish in the extreme, especially to our early twenty-first century eyes. For example, one could consider the headstrong and impulsive Lilia, packed off to Italy for a year with a chaperone by her husband's family in the hope that she will return 'not quite so vulgar' one of these rushing fools. Certainly her meeting and marriage of the unemployed (and son of a dentist, shock horror!) Gino within the space of a mere three weeks, in complete disregard for her nine-year old daughter, or first husband's family may be counted foolish, particularly by the standards of the time. Expecially when the tragic outcome of that decision is made clear. Despite her flaws, though, one cannot help but admire her for her courage in rebelling against and challenging the status quo - the status quo which appears to imprison so many in Edwardian English society.
However, what about the rest of the cast of this insightful and oh-so-English novel? There is Mrs Herriton Senior, for a start. A woman so caught up with herself and the requirements of 'society' that she sends her son and daughter off on what may very well be thought of as a fool's errand to collect the child of Lilia's fateful second marriage by whatever means possible - paying Gino off, if necessary. Her evident hypocrisy and cruelty appears to be indicative of that of society as a whole. And they, Philip and Harriet, in their turn, may also be considered foolish, or at the very least weak, when they meekly comply with her requirements. (Although, as they have been under her thumb their whole lives, perhaps it is understandable).
This tragic novel (and Forster is a master tragedian) has some happy moments, however. The opera scene is a complete joy and very funny. Here, Caroline helps Philip to discover happiness, and he begins to fall in love with her. Also quite wonderful are Forster's beautiful descriptions of Italy, reflecting his deep love for the country. Indeed, as Oliver Stallybrass points out in his informative introduction, this book is, in part, based on his own trip to Milan. The line 'it was an irritable couple who took tickets to Monteriano' is almost an exact replica of one from Forster's journal, where the destination was, instead, Milan, and where it had been preceded by an equally unfortunate and tiresome catelogue of events. Perhaps, therefore, there is something of Edward Morgan Forster in the character of Philip, who, although weak and equally tainted by his family's snobbery, one cannot help but like. (Indeed, he lost his father when very young, and was likewise brought up in the world of women). Sadly, Harriet's impatience brings about the sorrowful end to this poignant novel - and all are left to think on its meaning.
All in all, this novel embodies the description of Forster's work made on the Forster questionnaire webpage 'concise, but rich'. Taste and see!
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LibraryThing member edella
amazon - "When attractive, impulsive English widow Lidia takes a holiday in Italy, she causes a scandal by marrying Gino, a dashing and highly unsuitable Italian twelve years her junior. Her prim, snobbish in-laws make no attempts to hide their disapproval, and when Lidia’s decision eventually
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brings disaster, her English relatives embark on an expedition to face the uncouth foreigner. But when they are confronted by the beauty of Italy and the charm and vitality of the disreputable Gino, they are forced to examine their own narrow lives, and their reactions are emotional, violent and unexpected. " Show Less
LibraryThing member SLuce
Wanted to read an E. M. Forster book. Enjoyed
LibraryThing member jwhenderson
E. M. Forster's first novel tackles issues of national identity and the potential for interpersonal connection despite societal inequalities that would preoccupy Forster throughout his career. The action is split between England and Italy. Where Angels Fear to Tread culminates in a "song of madness
The novel is gruesome, accomplished, and darkly humorous. The best intentions fail and well-known ideas of virtue and vice fall to pieces in it. This kind of tragedy is distinctively Jamesian, and Philip's tale unmistakably invokes The Ambassadors' storyline. Similar to Strether in James' novel, Philip goes to the continent in order to save a fellow countryman from disgrace (first Lilia, then her son), only to fall in love with the place, find himself in the unlikely position of defending it, and have additional "ambassadors" (Harriet and Caroline Abbott) sent in order to save his mission. John Marcher, the main character of Henry James' "The Beast in the Jungle," and, in a way, the model for Strether, have similarities with Philip in his disengagement from life and inability to make snap decisions. However, Philip's tragedy is more difficult to accept because of his conviction that nothing can save him, which is actually the reverse of Strether's.
The action of this novel somewhat presages aspects of Forster's third novel, A Room With A View. As first novels go, this one is one of the best with a literary touch that Forster would continue to develop in his more famous later novels.
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and death" similar to the sad opera Lucia di Lammermoor, which turns raucously amusing in one of the novel's most memorable sequences, yet at times veers into farce.The novel is gruesome, accomplished, and darkly humorous. The best intentions fail and well-known ideas of virtue and vice fall to pieces in it. This kind of tragedy is distinctively Jamesian, and Philip's tale unmistakably invokes The Ambassadors' storyline. Similar to Strether in James' novel, Philip goes to the continent in order to save a fellow countryman from disgrace (first Lilia, then her son), only to fall in love with the place, find himself in the unlikely position of defending it, and have additional "ambassadors" (Harriet and Caroline Abbott) sent in order to save his mission. John Marcher, the main character of Henry James' "The Beast in the Jungle," and, in a way, the model for Strether, have similarities with Philip in his disengagement from life and inability to make snap decisions. However, Philip's tragedy is more difficult to accept because of his conviction that nothing can save him, which is actually the reverse of Strether's.
The action of this novel somewhat presages aspects of Forster's third novel, A Room With A View. As first novels go, this one is one of the best with a literary touch that Forster would continue to develop in his more famous later novels.
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LibraryThing member LauGal
I read this book half way thru and gave up. Although I liked the storyline,I just had no empathy for the characters. I like E.M. Forster but this is not my favorite.
LibraryThing member dylkit
The copy I have has a rather garish film tie -in cover. I like this one much better. Ironically, the actor who played Gino is the only member of the cast not to have an entry on Wikipedia..but I digress.
I have read Room With a View and Howards End. Both due for a re-read, I think. Unfortunately I
Forster said "The object of the book was the improvement of Phillip". I think Phiilip only improved marginally, if at all.
I have read Room With a View and Howards End. Both due for a re-read, I think. Unfortunately I
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don't think Angels is a patch on them, but I understand it was his first novel, so I will forgive him that. It was the first novel set in Italy that I have read since going there myself, but I was disappointed in Forster's characterisation of it. He seems to have a love/hate relationship with Italy and to be attracted and repulsed by it at the same time. The result was Italy seemed like nothing more than a painted backdrop inhabited by stereotypes. Forster said "The object of the book was the improvement of Phillip". I think Phiilip only improved marginally, if at all.
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LibraryThing member JulesJones
There are plenty of other reviews, so I will only note that I liked part of the novel, but it didn't quite gel for me even though I like this sort of social satire. I don't regret the time spent reading it but am not inclined to re-read. It's out of copyright in some countries, and thus available
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on public domain sites. Show Less
LibraryThing member DeltaQueen50
I just completed reading Where Angels Fear to Tread by E. M. Forster and unfortunately, I really didn’t like the plot or the characters, finding it an altogether depressing read. It is often called a “comedy of manners”, but I found nothing amusing about the book. From the very upright and
For me, Where Angels Fear to Tread was a sad story of unfulfilled passions and life unlived. This was Forster’s first novel, written when he was 26, and I felt that it was uneven and at times rather cruel. Of course there were glimmers of his writing genuis but in this early work, he still had quite some way to go.
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staid British characters to the handsome but uncultured and rather stereotypic Italian, Gino, there wasn’t a sympathetic character among them.For me, Where Angels Fear to Tread was a sad story of unfulfilled passions and life unlived. This was Forster’s first novel, written when he was 26, and I felt that it was uneven and at times rather cruel. Of course there were glimmers of his writing genuis but in this early work, he still had quite some way to go.
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LibraryThing member psalva
I am left rattled by this novel. The plot twists were rather jarring. I felt my expectations being toyed with. There was a travel sequence in the middle that had language which delighted me, and some of the dialogue was really sharp. However, the plot did not resolve in a satisfying way for me.
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I’m doing a read-along of all of Forster this year and I’m looking forward to see how his writing developed. There is brilliance here, but in a small dose. Show Less
LibraryThing member etxgardener
The stuffy and moralistic English middle classes are in full view when the wayward widowed sister-in-law finds love in Italy with a handsome (and younger) Italian man and marries him. When she conveniently dies in childbirth, the family aren’t very aggrieved, but the thought of leaving one of
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their own to be raised by “those people” is not to be born. The family mounts a rescue mission to bring the child back to England. This expedition, shows the English family at their worst and sets the scene for a terrible tragedy. This is Forster at his finest. Show Less
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Awards
Language
Original publication date
1905
Physical description
192 p.; 8 inches
ISBN
0679736344 / 9780679736349