Customer Reviews

Black Narcissus

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English and Irish nuns work to establish a convent in a disused palace, in a remote tea-growing area of India. Ancient debaucheries seem to echo in the carved hallways, and finally the sensuous and pagan spirit of the dwelling saps their strenuous ideals. Tragedy forces the mother superior faces up to her own character flaws and emerge a wiser person. Elegantly and sparsely written,with a poetic and keen perception.

The story is simple. Nuns are sent to an old palace in the mountains near Darjeeling to start a nunnery. They plan to open a school and a dispensary, to run the orchards. But things are not as easy as they seem. The Sisters find themselves haunted by the beauty of the mountains, their memories, even the very air.
They question why they are there and why they are Nuns. Each and every Sister has to fight her own battle and, sadly for them, they don't win. But they learn from it and, therefore, it is not their final defeat either.
The story has a clear theme of how one needs to either join a land or ignore it. You can't live there and pretend to be a visitor. But the Sisters could not join it nor could they ignore it, and therefore they were trapped in a limbo of unhappiness and memory.
I can see why it was made into a movie. Mr. Dean is a great character. He isn't rude, just honest and his views on religion is remarkable. This book is a must for anybody.

Rungli-Rungliot was Rumer Godden's first attempt to introduce her autobiographical anecdotes. It was published by Penguin Paperback which she had donated for free distribution to the Armed Forces. The episodes of Black Narcissus and Rungli-Rungliot or its redacted version 'This Far and No Further' are intertwined in substance, that Rumer Godden had written it to celebrate her own father's eternal love life in the neighbouring tea estate of Gielle, before he went down to the Plains to manage a jute factory.

The story of Black Narcissus revolves around a Convent, which was in real life called Greenshield, a Boarding School run by two very resourceful English women, Phyllis Hill and Blanche Whitehall for the benefit of Gurkha Mem's children. Kanchhi, the prominent character of the book as well as the film, was Mr Godden's Gurkha wife, Rumer Godden's step-mother; she is seen being "educated" here, and who was actually the Black Narcissus.

In those halcyon days, most of the Managers of the tea estates were married to local Gurkha wives and those Managers had taken pains to tutor their wives to be refined and sophisticated enough to comfortably fit in Western Society. Unfortunately, the film makers have totally ruined the spirit of the Black Narcissus by Indianising it and so a beautiful chapter of the Raj Era where the Brits had interacted with the Gurkhas at social circle in the tea estates of Darjeeling is forever lost to the reading public.

The book arrived in a timely fashion and was as described. I am very happy with the service and am looking forward to reading this 70 year old novel.

This film must be watched 5 times to understand all the layers of meaning.

amazing how it shows how we live in past dreams and future projections

black narcissus does the best job of any film ever made of showing how past thoughts and dreams and hopes and fantasies of characters and also the dreams of others can intrude on present happiness. Can intrude on present moments, present thoughts. Do we live in the present moment the real world or a mixture of past thoughts and dreams and illusions

first of all who is this black narcissus, is it the Raj or General or son of the Raj? The nuns are trying to implant good wholesome dreams and ideas and hopes into the children and also the son of the Raj (he is one who the nuns are successful with because he learns compassion and cares for a cast aside woman) In the first scene we see and old shriveled face of old nun and then the perfect young beautiful face of the young nun. What would make such a beauty choose this life? what tragedy? what past? what past does each of us have? that is not seen? painful?

the old shriveled face of old nun is the future destiny of the perfect young beautiful young nun.

Later we see an Irishman in a beautiful Irish lake in summer with sun and this man even though he is living in a kind of paradise on earth, a heaven and a beautiful woman is in love with him and with him. He has had ideas and dreams implanted into him by his american Irish uncle about leaving Ireland and getting rich in america.

black narcissus black narcissus is the film that the new film inception was stolen from!!!

black narcissus is the story of a prince who like many people was self absorbed also he was self and macho obsessed, it is about the planting of dreams and hopes into his mind by the nuns, basically Christian values, also the nuns plant dreams into the young childrens minds at the school run by the nuns who come to the village at 9000 feet to teach them. It is about the nuns planting education. it is about planting ideas. black narcissus is about planting vegetables to eat to be healthy. black narcissus is about the nuns planting ideas of jesus, love, compassion forgiveness, and loving others not just yourself. black narcissus is about higher values vs. lower ones. Love vs lust. Selfishness of an alcoholic vs. the devotion and purity of nuns helping others.

black narcissus is also about an irish man who was too selfish and perhaps also metro sexual, an irish man who comes to america to be with his "uncle" but is it his uncle in america he is going to see or is it a lover, also is this irish man,
why does he not see the perfect paradise beauty of this woman and of Ireland,
why does he not marry her, she has money, she is loaded, so something must be
going on inside the irish mans mind, he has the ideas of greed also planted in
his mind probably by the american uncle, so he leaves ireland. dreams and
ideas of greed planted by someone else, causing him not to be at peace. Also he has the idea planted in him that he has to be a man and make money on his own and he cannot live off of a womans money.

also who is the black narcissus of the title is it the father of the prince.

the drunk man loves only himself and alcohol that is why he is alone in the mountains

did you see inception yet, this is movie from 1947 that inception was stolen from, lock stock and gun barrel, black narcissus is bit slow but amazing how it shows how humans live in past dreams and future projections
there are some silly parts but when you think that well what this woman has to deal with her past life not being like she had hoped and the pain and disappointment of that, all these emotions thought out the entire movie... every time the tibet horn blows reality shifts

you can watch the entire film online

in this film the nuns are trying to insert or plant
good dreams and hopes and thoughts and good moral and loving caring compassionate dreams and thoughts thru prayer meditation education

then Hollywood empire stole the idea of the film and with the sick twisted mind of Hollywood took a beautiful story about peace and love and transcendence.
then give it the Hollywood people the take the film and they first steal the idea then make it about stealing other peoples dreams and implanting dreams which is what people do around doing in reality perhaps

this movie black narcissus does the best job of showing how past thoughts and dreams and fantasies and also the dreams of others can intrude on present
happiness of any film or art form ever made. in that sense it has a deep Buddhist message

watch it twice to get all the sub plots, like the prince and the orphan
seductress who is probably the illegitamate daughter of the king and his
females.