Rating: 
Summary: Clare Marvel...Who are You?
Review: In novels of Obsession it is absolutely necessary that the object of said obsession be portrayed as extraordinary in one way or in many ways or another. Think about "Lolita" and Humbert Humbert: Lolita was very young, very beautiful, very nubile and very forbidden. Or think of Gustave's obsession in "Death in Venice,"Tadzio to whom oddly enough, the same adjectives above can apply.
In John Burham Schwartz's "Claire Marvel" we have a novel of Obsession in which the object of said obsession is portrayed as little more than someone beautiful who flits in and out of the protaganist Julian Rose's life over the course of 15 years; not even developed enough to be called an enigma. Even though Tadzio and Lolita are mere ciphers; repositories of their obsessors collective fantasies, they have "lives" within this context that makes them viable in the world of their novels. Claire Marvel does not. Schwartz paints her in the broadest, vaguest strokes:..."eyes alive with amusement; a refined nose...straight brown hair....a body slender and lithe." Julian's relationship with Clare is the least interesting in the entire novel. It's as if Schwartz lost interest in her when he realized that other characters like his father, his PHD thesis advisor or one of his troubled students proved to be the easier write.
For a supposed love story, "Claire Marvel"'s better developed characters are ancilliary like Julian's father for example. Through the course of the book, Julian's relationship with his father develops from estrangement and distrust, based on Julian's mother separation from his father, to a touching scene near the end of the novel, set in a park, between the two: "For an hour we stayed there, not saying much....I remembered walking in the park as a little boy holding my father's hand.....then I felt his hand on my shoulder. He squeezed hard and for a long time, and the pressure rose at the bottom of my throat was almost unbearable...he didn't know the comfort he gave, just sitting on that bench with me. Though I hoped he did." A simple scene ,where most of the emotion is held back, but beautifully composed and written. Unfortunately there are no such scenes between Julian and Clare that reach this level of refinement.
There are several other scenes in "Clare Marvel" that are beautifully written and Schwartz is obviously a fine writer, but when the central issue of a novel is as underdeloped as it is here, I would have to say the "Clare Marvel" is a failure....a sometimes gorgeously written failure, but a failure nontheless.
Rating:
Summary: Clare Marvel...Who are You?
Review: In novels of Obsession it is absolutely necessary that the object of said obsession be portrayed as extraordinary in one way or in many ways or another. Think about "Lolita" and Humbert Humbert: Lolita was very young, very beautiful, very nubile and very forbidden. Or think of Gustave's obsession in "Death in Venice,"Tadzio to whom oddly enough, the same adjectives above can apply.
In John Burham Schwartz's "Claire Marvel" we have a novel of Obsession in which the object of said obsession is portrayed as little more than someone beautiful who flits in and out of the protaganist Julian Rose's life over the course of 15 years; not even developed enough to be called an enigma. Even though Tadzio and Lolita are mere ciphers; repositories of their obsessors collective fantasies, they have "lives" within this context that makes them viable in the world of their novels. Claire Marvel does not. Schwartz paints her in the broadest, vaguest strokes:..."eyes alive with amusement; a refined nose...straight brown hair....a body slender and lithe." Julian's relationship with Clare is the least interesting in the entire novel. It's as if Schwartz lost interest in her when he realized that other characters like his father, his PHD thesis advisor or one of his troubled students proved to be the easier write.
For a supposed love story, "Claire Marvel"'s better developed characters are ancilliary like Julian's father for example. Through the course of the book, Julian's relationship with his father develops from estrangement and distrust, based on Julian's mother separation from his father, to a touching scene near the end of the novel, set in a park, between the two: "For an hour we stayed there, not saying much....I remembered walking in the park as a little boy holding my father's hand.....then I felt his hand on my shoulder. He squeezed hard and for a long time, and the pressure rose at the bottom of my throat was almost unbearable...he didn't know the comfort he gave, just sitting on that bench with me. Though I hoped he did." A simple scene ,where most of the emotion is held back, but beautifully composed and written. Unfortunately there are no such scenes between Julian and Clare that reach this level of refinement.
There are several other scenes in "Clare Marvel" that are beautifully written and Schwartz is obviously a fine writer, but when the central issue of a novel is as underdeloped as it is here, I would have to say the "Clare Marvel" is a failure....a sometimes gorgeously written failure, but a failure nontheless.
Rating: 
Summary: I Marvel that I Managed to Finish This Book
Review: Most of this book was pointless fluff. Why do we need to know every detail about the main character's teaching and his marriage and blah blah blah? The few chapters with Claire in the beginning were not enough to convince me of a great love -- and the reason for their (prolonged) seperation didn't convince me either, so nothing in-between held me. At many points I wondered what I was reading for. He seemed obsessed, she seemed morose -- I didn't care one way or the other by the end. And I'm a romantic!!!
Rating: 
Summary: AN EXEMPLARY ACHIEVEMENT
Review: Simply put "Claire Marvel" is a triumph. A love story rendered in singing prose it is compelling and heartrending, exciting and true. "There was before her and now there is after her," it begins, " and that is the difference in my life." Two Harvard graduate students meet by chance on a rainy day. Claire offers Julian cover beneath her umbrella, a chance encounter which will forever change them both. They are very much alike these two, although each puzzles the other. They are drawn to one another, a love affair begins yet it is as if their bodies have connected but not their souls. After a time Claire asks Julian to join her in France but their idyll is short-lived. Upon returning to the United States she chooses to marry someone else. Nonetheless, the connection between Julian and Claire remains, a link that influences the future even after Julian, too, marries another. It is in the exploration of this abiding connectedness that the novel glows, contemplating what might have been, pondering deathless hope, and probing the impenetrable workings of the human heart. "Claire Marvel" is an exemplary achievement. Read it and rejoice; read it and weep. - Gail Cooke
Rating:
Summary: AN EXEMPLARY ACHIEVEMENT
Review: Simply put "Claire Marvel" is a triumph. A love story rendered in singing prose it is compelling and heartrending, exciting and true. "There was before her and now there is after her," it begins, " and that is the difference in my life." Two Harvard graduate students meet by chance on a rainy day. Claire offers Julian cover beneath her umbrella, a chance encounter which will forever change them both. They are very much alike these two, although each puzzles the other. They are drawn to one another, a love affair begins yet it is as if their bodies have connected but not their souls. After a time Claire asks Julian to join her in France but their idyll is short-lived. Upon returning to the United States she chooses to marry someone else. Nonetheless, the connection between Julian and Claire remains, a link that influences the future even after Julian, too, marries another. It is in the exploration of this abiding connectedness that the novel glows, contemplating what might have been, pondering deathless hope, and probing the impenetrable workings of the human heart. "Claire Marvel" is an exemplary achievement. Read it and rejoice; read it and weep. - Gail Cooke
Rating: 
Summary: excellent writing except....
Review: This book had very poignant moments but overall the characters seemed just too idiotic to be believed. The main problem for me was that it wasn't obvious why Claire Marvel was so great, why she was worthy of unremitting love. She has a few witty remarks and is supposedly beautiful but what of it? Her acts are not justifiable and therefore you can't relate to her or to the protagnist. In the end I just wanted to knock both character's heads together because they acted so stupidly. I suppose their inability to commit to each other might be some underlying theme of the novel but it makes very frustrating reading!!!
Rating:
Summary: AVOID AT ALL COSTS!
Review: This book is just plain awful. It's overwritten, pretentious, completely unbelievable, shallow -- all that, and still unbearably full of itself. I was very much looking forward to this book, both as a pleasure read and as a literary experience. I was impressed by Schwartz's last book, by his emotional sensitivity and perception combined with what seemed like an almost unerring instict for the right word and well-balanced sentence, and so the fact that he was writing a love story was perfectly appealing. So few writers, especially male writers, seem to be able to write a good, romantic book, a book that really captures what it means, what it feels like to be in love. But this male writer, Mr. Schwartz, definitely can't -- it's pure pap. He seems to be afraid to make the characters anything but horrifying cliches or they might become "unlovable," which seems like exactly the mistake that makes Fabio-decorated genre romance fiction so stupid -- and Claire Marvel is even worse than that... This book is just shockingly bad -- it seems it's first failure, to elicit real human empathy, drags the rest down, so that Schwartz's prose feels desperate to make an impression, his characters feel like Ivy League caricatures, the story hollow and unbelievable. Hopefully Schwartz can do better next time. He has a lot to make up for.
Rating: 
Summary: I loved this book
Review: This is a beautifully written and emotionally courageous story of a man and the way in which he circles endlessly towards and away from the woman of his life, Claire Marvel. The tension between these two characters has such weight, and builds with such suspense, that that I stayed up until almost two in the morning to find out how the book would end. A terrific read.
Rating:
Summary: A Marvel
Review: This is a stunning novel. The writing is resonant with wisdom and graced with poetry. Beautiful storytelling from first to last. You will weep. But this is not a sentimental tale. It has all the restraints of fine literature and the emotional suspense of great novels. Buy it. Read it. I give it five very enthusiastic stars.
Rating:
Summary: A classic in the making
Review: This is an exquisite novel. Schwartz (Reservation Road) is one of the finest young writers of literary fiction today, and this is his most accomplished work to date. The second half of the novel includes some of the most beautiful and elegant writing I've read in years. The characters, the places (Cambridge, France, New York), the poetry of the language, and the richness of experience will linger in your mind long after you've finished reading. I cannot recommend this book more enthusiastically.
|
