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Title details for What Maisie Knew by Henry James - Available

What Maisie Knew

by Henry James
Lorna Raver
Audiobook
1 of 1 copy available
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In this classic tale of the death of childhood, there is a savage comedy that owes much to Dickens. But for his portrayal of the child's capacity for intelligent wonder, James summons all the subtlety he devotes elsewhere to his most celebrated adult protagonists.

In the aftermath of an acrimonious divorce, young Maisie Farange finds herself shuttled back and forth between her father and mother and their new spouses, all of whom are monstrously self-involved. Neglected and exploited by everyone around her, Maisie herself becomes a pretext for sexual intrigue when her stepparents become attracted to each other. As Maisie opens her young eyes on this distinctly modern world, the death of her childhood provides Henry James with a vehicle for scathing social satire.

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Release date

    January 11, 2012

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Listen audiobook

      • ISBN: 9781483053202
      • File size: 334320 KB
      • Duration: 11:36:29

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • AudioFile Magazine
      Maisie's parents, whose fecklessness challenges credulity, have divorced each other, then each abandoned their second spouses, then quit the stage entirely, leaving Maisie with two stepparents and a nanny in conflict, as all three of them seem desperately to want to keep and raise the orphan. Maisie, who has had virtually no education and spent almost no time with other children, is the narrator's great challenge, written as blankly innocent but with adult speech patterns and a hyper-attentive shrewdness. Lorna Raver makes her human. Her adults are even better, vivid and self-revealing, and outmaneuvered by Maisie. Raver's English accents are not perfect, but this distracts little from the pleasure of her performance, which is filled with intelligent empathy and human warmth for these unlikely characters. B.G. © AudioFile 2012, Portland, Maine
    • Publisher's Weekly

      November 26, 2012
      Young Maisie Farange finds herself the unwitting pawn in her parents’ divorce, as her mother and father use her as a tool for personal attacks. As both parents find new romantic partners, Maisie, who is mature beyond her age, is thrust even further into an adult world of betrayal and sexual gamesmanship. In this audio edition, Maureen O’Brien delivers a standout performance of James’s classic novella. Even for audiences who might not enjoy James’s prose, O’Brien’s narration is both gripping and suitably melancholy. She captures the boiling anger of the adult world, as well as Maisie’s sadness and confusion. Maisie’s relationship with her governess Mrs. Wix, the sole point of emotional consistency in the young girl’s life, is particularly poignant, thanks to O’Brien’s reading. Though there’s relatively little dialogue in James’s work—most of the action takes place through narration, filtered through Maisie’s point of view—O’Brien excels at creating unique personalities for the different characters. Her Maisie, in particular, sounds like a child—intelligent but also extremely vulnerable.

    • AudioFile Magazine
      Juliet Stevenson provides a compelling narration of Henry James's story about innocence, social class, and morality. The protagonist, Maisie, struggles to preserve her innocence when her parents divorce and her stepparents commit adultery. Seemingly effortlessly, Stevenson changes her voice to match her characters' traits: Maisie's innocent demeanor, her stepfather Sir Claude's confident poise, her stepmother Ms. Overmore's patronizing personality, her nanny Mrs. Wix's didactic disposition, and her parents Ida's and Beale's narcissistic attitudes. Stevenson's pace is slow and steady--in harmony with every moment. However, even with her elegant English accent, her performance is challenged by the author's long sentences. Overall, though, Stevenson's pleasant narration makes James's complex and long-winded novel an auditory treat. A.C. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2019, Portland, Maine

Formats

  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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