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j_greer's review against another edition
2.0
Isherwood captures the essence of what I can only imagine 1940s teatime gossip atmospheres felt like. Similar to doomscrolling buzzfeed forums and Instagram wordrpress links, after three or four times, it's desperately hard to keep going.
The decadent lifestyle Isherwood maintains is magnetic no doubt, and this experimental autobiographic novel dazzles at times. At others, the prose stalls, jokes fall flat and the narrative is plain boring.
I imagine Isherwood would have been rather popular in modernity's progressive age. How this potentiality affects his craft and literature is a bit more difficult to place. As artifacts and snapshots of culture, his work is very much worth the read.
The decadent lifestyle Isherwood maintains is magnetic no doubt, and this experimental autobiographic novel dazzles at times. At others, the prose stalls, jokes fall flat and the narrative is plain boring.
I imagine Isherwood would have been rather popular in modernity's progressive age. How this potentiality affects his craft and literature is a bit more difficult to place. As artifacts and snapshots of culture, his work is very much worth the read.
jbash_lo_fi's review against another edition
2.0
Enjoyable in parts but it really lost me in the last story (Paul).
joelhwall's review against another edition
4.0
While maybe not the most well-crafted of stories, I will forever be intrigued by Isherwood's reading of the colourful people he knew and met throughout his life.
classicbhaer's review
4.0
I finally read Down There on a Visit and I did enjoy it overall. As I have said 1000 times, his writing style is so enjoyable I think he could write about anything and I would enjoy it to some extent. I really enjoyed how this was broken down into sections based off of the main characters life. Also, this wrap up proves the point that you will not always love every book by an author you love and that is okay.
quincyk's review against another edition
adventurous
funny
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
roh222's review against another edition
4.0
just what i wanted in an insherwood book. simple observations, just following people in their daily lives but still so in-depth. of the four sections, i think that the Ambrose section in Greece was most enjoyable
dillonrockrohr's review against another edition
medium-paced
4.5
The unique strength of this novel is Isherwood’s composition of an especially observant narrator who can be intimate, so close, to the central subjects of these character studies, and yet these characters still withdraw from him into the complicated mystery of themselves, their capacity to change, and their capacity to do authentically surprise. As though there are believable and inscrutable depths to these characters that Isherwood the writer knows is there and can trace, but doesn’t comprehend himself.
“I’m so near to this thing which is so far from me.”
“I’m so near to this thing which is so far from me.”
jennifer_silver's review against another edition
4.0
As my first Isherwood novel I wasn't entirely sure what to expect, and coming out of a reading slump I fully intended to struggle through this novel, and perhaps even stop midway and continue another.
Yet I found it to be engaging and insightful, particularly the structure with the 4 different fragments and settings, the transformations interlinking these fragments, such as Waldemar connecting Christopher from Mr Lancaster to Berlin to Greece, in turn created a web linking the narrators wanderings which ensured the reader knew it was the same narrator, despite the change in writing style. Also particularly striking is how the atmosphere of each location and each character is felt palpably, the reader too feels the anxiety over the Sudetenland crisis and the isolation on the Greek islands, and how although the 4 characters Isherwood creates are in themselves entirely forgettable (i.e. Ambrose in his isolation and Mr Lancaster's death), their character is felt assuredly through the page as a great part of the narrator's life.
Likewise, Christopher, the narrator, as a wanderer also has a significant effect, at the beginning of the novel, I personally expected for his settling somewhere, and perhaps a moralistic message at the novel's conclusion, and thus the unexpected continuation of his wanderings left me too asking and reflecting on the reason for life, an idea that came up a few times in the novel (as Paul remarks 'you really are a tourist, to your bones', a poignant note for the novel to finish on, as my suspicion behind the title was confirmed, which left me further reflecting).
The themes of homosexuality, spirituality, and pacifism were also strong (and from my research seem to be common themes of Isherwood's writing), and there were moments of unexpected comedy, where I found myself laughing, along with the occurrence of key events, i.e. the War and the rise of the Nazis, which are not often explicitly referred to (excluding the narrator's anxiety over the Sudetenland crisis and emergence of war) though they impact the atmosphere of a situation which was an interesting point
Overall, a brilliant novel, though I still feel like I am missing a key idea from the novel so hence the 4 stars
Yet I found it to be engaging and insightful, particularly the structure with the 4 different fragments and settings, the transformations interlinking these fragments, such as Waldemar connecting Christopher from Mr Lancaster to Berlin to Greece, in turn created a web linking the narrators wanderings which ensured the reader knew it was the same narrator, despite the change in writing style. Also particularly striking is how the atmosphere of each location and each character is felt palpably, the reader too feels the anxiety over the Sudetenland crisis and the isolation on the Greek islands, and how although the 4 characters Isherwood creates are in themselves entirely forgettable (i.e. Ambrose in his isolation and Mr Lancaster's death), their character is felt assuredly through the page as a great part of the narrator's life.
Likewise, Christopher, the narrator, as a wanderer also has a significant effect, at the beginning of the novel, I personally expected for his settling somewhere, and perhaps a moralistic message at the novel's conclusion, and thus the unexpected continuation of his wanderings left me too asking and reflecting on the reason for life, an idea that came up a few times in the novel (as Paul remarks 'you really are a tourist, to your bones', a poignant note for the novel to finish on, as my suspicion behind the title was confirmed, which left me further reflecting).
The themes of homosexuality, spirituality, and pacifism were also strong (and from my research seem to be common themes of Isherwood's writing), and there were moments of unexpected comedy, where I found myself laughing, along with the occurrence of key events, i.e. the War and the rise of the Nazis, which are not often explicitly referred to (excluding the narrator's anxiety over the Sudetenland crisis and emergence of war) though they impact the atmosphere of a situation which was an interesting point
Overall, a brilliant novel, though I still feel like I am missing a key idea from the novel so hence the 4 stars
cais's review against another edition
dark
funny
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
In the first volume of his diaries, Isherwood repeatedly mentions the difficulties he was having writing what became Down There On A Visit. The book had many different forms before he realized what he needed to do. Namely, he had to write about his own experiences in a slightly altered way.
As the character "Christopher Isherwood" says of himself in the beginning of this book, "To reassure himself, he converts [his life] into epic myth as fast as it happens. He is forever play acting." This is something the real Isherwood did. In fact, the Isherwood of this book is a very thinly-disguised version of the real one, and all of the characters and events are fictionalized versions of real people and events in his life. Some of this fictionalization is so slight that it is obvious who is who e.g. which characters are Isherwood's real life friends W.H. Auden or Gerald Heard. Some of it is more heavily disguised, because though in the 1950s Isherwood was pretty openly living as a gay man in California (he lived with his various boyfriends and toured the emerging gay scene), he didn't seem ready to write about it for public consumption, even in a fictionalized form. But queerness is a major subtext throughout this book.
A lot of the characters here are awful people who do awful things. Sometimes Isherwood is strangely passive about this, as though he recognizes the wrongness of some of it but likes the drama of it all and wants to see what happens next. He wants experience and seems drawn to people who can offer it, even if the costs are high.
The book covers four stages of his life starting in 1928 and ending in 1953 and each section focuses on one or two significant male friendships that shaped him in some way. He starts off as a cocky young man rebelling against his privileged background, coming from a wealthy, landed family and having a Cambridge education. He ends the book as a man in his forties pulled in two directions, seeking a deeper, spiritual meaning to his life while also craving the pleasures of the world.
Having read his diaries, much of this was familiar to me, but it was fascinating to see what details Isherwood chose to alter and to compare a real person, as he wrote about them in his diaries, with his fictional version of them. At times this book felt like Isherwood trying to understand why certain people were so important to him at various times in his life.
Isherwood is very funny, often in a cutting, critical way. But he points his critical lens at himself as much as at others. He is just a really good storyteller, a great scene-setter. His observations about people and their motivations are sharp. I found much of this book funny. Some of this book is, not quite infuriating, but there were situations and dialog that are disturbing on various levels. You don't have to have read his diaries or be familiar with much of his life to enjoy this book.
As the character "Christopher Isherwood" says of himself in the beginning of this book, "To reassure himself, he converts [his life] into epic myth as fast as it happens. He is forever play acting." This is something the real Isherwood did. In fact, the Isherwood of this book is a very thinly-disguised version of the real one, and all of the characters and events are fictionalized versions of real people and events in his life. Some of this fictionalization is so slight that it is obvious who is who e.g. which characters are Isherwood's real life friends W.H. Auden or Gerald Heard. Some of it is more heavily disguised, because though in the 1950s Isherwood was pretty openly living as a gay man in California (he lived with his various boyfriends and toured the emerging gay scene), he didn't seem ready to write about it for public consumption, even in a fictionalized form. But queerness is a major subtext throughout this book.
A lot of the characters here are awful people who do awful things. Sometimes Isherwood is strangely passive about this, as though he recognizes the wrongness of some of it but likes the drama of it all and wants to see what happens next. He wants experience and seems drawn to people who can offer it, even if the costs are high.
The book covers four stages of his life starting in 1928 and ending in 1953 and each section focuses on one or two significant male friendships that shaped him in some way. He starts off as a cocky young man rebelling against his privileged background, coming from a wealthy, landed family and having a Cambridge education. He ends the book as a man in his forties pulled in two directions, seeking a deeper, spiritual meaning to his life while also craving the pleasures of the world.
Having read his diaries, much of this was familiar to me, but it was fascinating to see what details Isherwood chose to alter and to compare a real person, as he wrote about them in his diaries, with his fictional version of them. At times this book felt like Isherwood trying to understand why certain people were so important to him at various times in his life.
Isherwood is very funny, often in a cutting, critical way. But he points his critical lens at himself as much as at others. He is just a really good storyteller, a great scene-setter. His observations about people and their motivations are sharp. I found much of this book funny. Some of this book is, not quite infuriating, but there were situations and dialog that are disturbing on various levels. You don't have to have read his diaries or be familiar with much of his life to enjoy this book.
eluz's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0