Waterstones Lavinia
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Price: £9.99
Brand: Waterstones
Description: An exceptional combination of history and mythology - 'an intriguing, luxuriously realised novel' FINANCIAL TIMES' Subtly moving, playful.a novel that brought me to tears more than once. Lavinia is a delightful heroine' GUARDIAN' Like Spartan Helen, I caused a war. She caused hers by letting men who wanted her take her. I caused mine because I wouldn't be given, wouldn't be taken, but chose my man and my fate. The man was famous, the fate obscure; not a bad balance.' Lavinia is the daughter of the King of Latium, a victorious warrior who loves peace; she is her father's closest companion. Now of an age to wed, Lavinia's mother favours her own kinsman, King Turnus of Rutulia, handsome, heroic, everything a young girl should want. Instead, Lavinia dreams of mighty Aeneas, a man she has heard of only from a ghost of a poet, who comes to her in the gods' holy place and tells her of her future, and Aeneas' past. If she refuses to wed Turnus, Lavinia knows she will start a war - but her fate was set the moment the poet appeared to her in a dream and told her of the adventurer who fled fallen Troy, holding his son's hand and carrying his father on his back.
Category: Books
Merchant: Waterstones
Product ID: 9780753827840
Delivery cost: 2.99
ISBN: 9780753827840
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Author: J.K. Currie
Rating: 5
Review: ‘Just then Aeneas, still far out from the land, saw a mighty forest, through which the Tiber flowed pleasantly, with rapid eddies and yellow from the quantities of sand, to burst forth into the sea.’ Virgil, Aeneid Book 7 ‘Out beyond that, on the dim sea I saw ships – a line of great, black ships, coming up from the south and wheeling and heading in to the river mouth. On each side of each ship a long rank of oars lifted and beat like the beat of wings in the twilight.’ Ursula K LeGuin, Lavinia This remarkable novel opens evocatively with a mirror image of the opening lines of Virgil’s Aeneid, Book 7 – Lavinia observes Aeneas as he observes his promised land for the first time. For those who do not know, the final six books of the Aeneid describe the war between the Trojan refugees and some of the native Italian peoples as the Trojans attempt to establish a new home in Italy. Lavinia is a key pawn in that war. The only child of the Italian king Latinus, she had been promised to the prince Turnus of Ardea, but the arrival of Aeneas changes matters. This is the story of that war from the point of view of Lavinia, in the Aeneid a beautiful young princess, yes, but one to whom Virgil does not give a single line of dialogue and whose only action is to blush in the presence of Turnus. It might be thought that LeGuin’s novel would be a feminist reimagining of an out-of-date tale and there is no doubt that Lavinia is given her say and her own thoughts throughout the novel. But the author repeatedly subverts our expectations: Lavinia’s scope for participation is still circumscribed by her society and her times; Leguin takes the tale beyond the ambiguous end of the Aeneid, beyond the death of Aeneas and introduces the character of the Poet, a ghostly figure with whom Lavinia communes in dreams and who is clearly a representation of Virgil himself. What is it about Virgil which attracts the literary greats in the twilight years of their lives? Is it because this great poet writes so movingly and convincingly about death? Is it because he so successfully laments the loss of youth? Just as Seamus Heaney’s final work was a masterful translation of Aeneid Book 6, so LeGuin has written an inspirational novel in homage to Virgil. Themes of exile, loss of innocence, untimely deaths, brutal violence, new beginnings, reconciliation, self-discovery all abound both in Virgil and in LeGuin’s version. To some extent, like Virgil, the novels of Ursula LeGuin have been a constant in my life. I began reading both authors while at school and have been reading them ever since, for pleasure, as a teacher, as a parent. Of all LeGuin’s books I have read this has been the most remarkable, evocative and personally satisfying. Post script: Lavinia’s blush: For over thirty years I have believed when (in Aeneid Book 12) she blushes in the presence of Turnus it shows her secret love for him and not for Aeneas. This novel has persuaded me that I was wrong!
Author: GemBookEater
Rating: 3
Review: Ursula K Le Guin has been writing novels for over 50 years. She’s just celebrated her 85th birthday (the day after my 45th – is that a sign? ???? ) and is universally acknowledged as the mistress of Science Fiction yet that is not all she writes. In fact, the setting, story and characters of this 2008 novel are based on the last six books of Vergil’s epic poem, the Aeneid. But deep history can be just as fertile ground as deep future or other planets. They say the past is another country so why can the deep past not be another planet? And there is something very otherworldly in this book. In essence, it is the story of Lavinia, daughter of the king of the Latins. When we meet her she will soon be of marriageable age and so suitors are flocking to pay her court. But Lavinia does not want to leave her home and father, she doesn’t want to forsake her gods to brush the altar for a husbands gods. Then she meets the poet. The poet is Virgil, as he lays dying many centuries hence somehow his spirit drifts into his unfinished epic where he meets Lavinia,she is a surprise to him for in his poem she is nothing, just a name. When he meets this intelligent, spirited, dark haired girl, he regrets leaving her character undescribed. Slowly she persuades him to tell her a little of her future. He tells her of the hero from Troy who will soon be landing there, that she will marry him and they will found the great nation of Rome. Her story unfolds just as Virgil promises and Lavinia is happy with her husband. But this is the golden age of heroes so the men must have their battles for glory’s sake. Over the last 40 years or so there have been several retellings of history (or legend, depending on your point of view) from the feminine perspective. As a feminist I am glad to see them, we need to hear as many women’s stories as we do men’s if we are ever to achieve a balanced society. The problem with many of them is that literature often follows what Joseph Cambell called ‘The Hero’s Journey’, a basic pattern found in many narratives around the world. According to Campbell, most stories have a hero who “ventures forth from the world of common day into a region of supernatural wonder: fabulous forces are there encountered and a decisive victory is won: the hero comes back from this mysterious adventure with the power to bestow boons on his fellow man.” This makes it hard to make a book about a minor character in someone else’s work exciting. After all, in the original work Lavinia is barely a footnote. She’s a princess who is won as a prize and has never left her own home. But Ursula K Le Guin overcomes this to an extent by recognising that every character is the hero of their own story. She focuses on Lavinia’s shorter physical journey which results meeting the poet and starting on the spiritual journey that helps her take control of her own future. This story doesn’t achieve the visceral thrill of an action-packed saga like the Aenid, but it does show the greater ramifications of constant adventuring on both those that fight for glory and those that share their lives. Her characters are clearly imagined and expressed, so even though they lived thousands of years ago they seem like old friends. It’s definitely worth a read, particularly if you are looking for a more meditative tale, I do wish she had fought her stepson more vehemently though. NB This review first appeared on The BookEaters Blog -> http://www.thebookeaters.co.uk/lavinia-by-ursula-k-le-guin/
