Customer Reviews

Darlington's Fall

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

What a wonderful combination of left brain and right brain this book is. It communicates in ways that no novel or poem ever could. No poem could have the emotional drive of this story with these characters - and yet the verse does much to heighten that drive in the most dramatic sequences. No novel could match the satisfying, complexly intelligent structure of this verse - but the sweep of this novel allows for intellectual explorations which - for me at least - no poem could ever support. Actually, I've never been a fan of long poems before, but I found the verse here very accessible - it supports the characters and the story, rather than simply calling attention to itself. I really enjoyed this book.

Novels in verse are fairly rare: Pushkin's 'Eugene Onegin', Vikram Seth's 'The Golden Gate', and Nobelist Derek Walcott's 'Omeros', come to mind. This novel is composed of ten-line stanzas with a rhyme scheme that mandates each line-end have a rhyme-mate somewhere in the stanza, but these ryhmes occur in irregular places, e.g. ABCCADDEEB, as in this sample verse, chosen at random from page 161:

(Nothing on earth, surely there's nothing on earth,
So hopeful, so suggestive of some gilt, goaled kindness
Or mercy at the heart of Nature than the notion
Of convergent evolution--
This thought that the ranged obstacles to any birth
Are immaterial and can be sidestepped . . .
The eye, for instance--look how Nature kept
Contriving it anew, freshly seeing its way
Out of the darkness--as if, at the end of the day,
The mind were _destined_ to escape from blindness.)

The language used tends to be only slightly elevated in tone, and conversational American English creeps in comfortably. Other reviewers have summarized the plot about the life of a boy prodigy who becomes a lepidopterist, has a terrible fall on a remote Pacific Island that cripples him. The protagonist is a gentle, lovable man whose training in Darwinian concepts leads him to accept the randomness and cruelty of life, but whose Wordsworthian love of Nature is never dimmed. I found the plot to be quite involving (as well as involved) and I had trouble slowing down my reading to savor the poetry.

A book to be treasured and re-read.

I was initially attracted to this book because I HAVE been to Ponape (now known as Pohnpei) and was surprised to find the obscure island a location for a novel. I was further intrigued by the idea of a novel in verse form (although I must admit that this aspect alone might have led me to avoid it). I'm glad I didn't. The verse is musical without being obvious, distracting (or obtuse), and the story is an interesting one--a love story on many levels and one that makes insightful observations about human nature, natural selection, adaption and evolution. Despite the joy it brought me, I did find myself at times wanting more--more detail, more exploration, more connection between the "writer" and his "subject." But that is a minor complaint, for a book that surprised me in so many ways.

At the risk of hyperbole, I'm going to say it: this is a work of genius. It's a shame that it occupies such a weird literary purgatory (by virtue of being a memeber of that platypus-like form, the novel in verse) because it deserves to be read and taught in schools, made part of the cannon, and above all to sell a million copies. But who would want to read a really long poem about an entomologist? Answer: everyone--if that poem is as moving, as transcendant, as good a story, and as unobtrusive in its pyrotechnics as this one. yes, there are fireworks, but most of the time you forget it's the fourth of july. read it if you like novels. read it if you're a student of poetry. as an amateur writer of both myself, I can only describe it as a humbling expereince. leithauser deserves your money. Darlington's Fall

I couldn't help wondering as I read this book whether there's a limit to the worldly (and other-worldly) charms to which Leithauser seems to hold the key. I concluded there isn't.

I've never been to either Indiana or Ponape, but having tracked Russ Darlington's life, I now feel comfortable claiming to know both places. "Darlington's Fall" is a magical journey through beautiful landscapes and weighty terrain. It's certainly a trip worth taking.

My book club had expressed interest in reading poetry in addition to the novels. Brad Leithauser's Darlington's Fall, a novel in verse, proved to be the perfect selection. One savors the language while being engrossed in the story. While dissecting such elements of prosody as proximate versus exact rhymes, one can also engage the big questions of science and daily life and love. Poetry suffuses the work, but it never slows the reader down. The illustrations, which announce each chapter, done by Brad's brother, Mark Leithauser, marvelously exhibit the antic style and love of detail that is found in Brad's writing. This book succeeds on so many levels that the reviewer can only provide the barest hints of the jewels to be found. You really have to read it yourself

I bought this book for $1 at a drug store, initially for the intriguing illustrations that captured my attention. I enjoy creating collages and was about to rip the book to shreds for the pictures when I realized the entire story was a poem, and not only that but a very structured poem that rhymed well... so I began to read it, wondering how the author could make the entire story rhyme throughout.
It was the most beautiful biography of a fictional character I think I have ever encountered. The poetry flowed so convincingly and naturally that unless I began to read out loud, I forgot I was reading a poem. There was none of the awkward sentence structure that poets sometimes need to employ in order to combine sense and rhyme. It was a wonderful story, beautifully written. This book has everything; science, poetry, art, romance, discovery, plot, strong character development and is told in a truly amazing way; content and execution being both worthwhile.
My favorite part is how, chapter by chapter, the significance of the title takes on the most remarkable series of metamorphous. What an exceptional find- I can't imagine I would have dared tear it up for the pictures... the very least in hierarchy of the attributes it contained.
Why on earth would someone sell such an extraordinary book for a mere dollar? It is worth far more in my opinion.