The God in Flight [Paperback]

Laura Argiri (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1, 1996

In 1878, while attending Yale University and trying to escape his father's abusiveness, Simion Satterwhite meets art professor Doriskos Klionarios, and they begin a tumultuous love affair scorned by their society. Reprint.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Argiri's ambitious, captivating debut is a Victorian novel with a twist: her lovers are "men of the lavender persuasion." Pale, blond 16-year-old Simion Satterwhite, the battered child of a hateful West Virginia fundamentalist preacher, arrives at Yale in 1878. His path soon crosses that of the darkly handsome, 31-year-old Doriskos Klionarios, a Greek-born professor and artist with his own shrouded past. The attraction is immediate; indeed, Dori has for years sketched the face of an unknown boy who comes to life in Simion. Yet the virginal Dori fears to consummate his love for the boy, while it takes the catharsis of near-fatal illness to make Simion understand the depth of Dori's devotion. (Simion's bad health-stomach ulcers and fainting spells-suggest the convention of Victorian heroines.) During the summer of Simion's convalescence, Doriskos is inspired to create The God in Flight, a marble sculpture in the Classical style modeled on himself and Simion. The statue, which wins a prestigious prize for sculpture, for a time threatens to be their undoing. Argiri's lush prose is infused with a romantic sensibility: ice buckets filled with melting snow, sheets edged in Battenberg lace, gifts of coral roses. Though she ignores the historical sweep of the era (the aftereffects of the Civil War and Reconstruction are barely mentioned), Argiri provides an enchanting menagerie of bullies and villains, friends and mentors. And her pair of lovers are as memorable as Mary Renault's Alexander and Bagoas. Many readers should be delighted by this haunting blend of melodrama and fancy.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Library Journal

Set primarily in the 1880s at Yale, Argiri's first novel is the love story of precocious undergraduate Simion Satterwhite and exotic art professor Doriskos Klionarios. A prize-winning sculpture publicizes their breaking of the double taboos against homosexuality and student/faculty relationships. The novel does a fine job of illustrating the transforming power and beauty of true love as it presents gay and straight men in a variety of relationships. (There is only one female character in the novel.) Though not without flaws, this novel satisfies the historic need for well-rounded portraits of real love between homosexuals. Heterosexual women read romances, as do gay men, and this romantic novel may bridge the two fiction markets. For libraries buying in either genre.
Rebecca S. Kelm, Northern Kentucky Univ. Lib., Highland Heights
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 496 pages
• Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics) (May 1, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0140254137
• ISBN-13: 978-0140254136
• Product Dimensions: 7.7 x 5.1 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (29 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #165,489 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars If you love your mind, read this book!!, September 23, 2005

By 

GhostHelwig "the one under your foot" (Middle Of Nowhere) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The God in Flight: A Novel (Hardcover)

I'm going to start this by saying - if the idea of two men kissing, falling in love, and yes, having sex, in any way bothers you, just walk away from this book right now.

Still with me? Good. Because this book is just too good to be ignored.

The editorial review from Publishers Weekly up above there pretty much covers the storyline, so I'll make my description of it brief: young Simion Satterwhite is a precocious, brilliant, and stubborn student at Yale University in the 1880s, who meets and falls in the love with his professor Doriskos Klionarios, a shy, sheltered, almost ethereal man who has loved Simion (or rather, his image) from long before they even met.

Their love story plays out, much more believably than any 'typical' romance novel, throughout the course of the book. And for those who care about those things, sex is described in as much detail as anything else - but if you think sex is a focus of the book then you're missing the point.

The characters in this novel aren't your typical fare, either. Simion is stubborn almost to a fault, proud, self-reliant, and in nearly all ways the 'stronger' of the two men. (A previous review that described him as 'weepy' left me baffled; even when being beaten, Simion rarely ever cries. Righteous anger is much more like him.) Though he is, arguably, still young when he meets Doriskos at the age of sixteen, it should be noted that (the rest of this paragraph is a SPOILER) he and Doriskos do not fully consummate their relationship until after he turns eighteen.

Doriskos himself is a very different character from Simion; he is almost pathologically shy, having spent much of his life in the neglectful hands of a foster father who never could relate to him. Because of his isolated upbringing, Doriskos is innocent almost to the point of being simply dense, and his emotions, when finally roused, are as intense as Simion's but seem even more so from being much closer to his skin.

Side characters, from volatile, obsessive Peter to charming playboy Andy to Simion's wise, ailing tutor Simeon Lincoln, are just as fleshed out as the leads. Two such characters, Moses and Helmut, play a big role in the relationship burgeoning between Simion and Doriskos, and the beautiful interplay between the four very different men is truly a pleasure to read.

In fact, the entirety of this novel is a pleasure - reading it, I found myself thinking (when I was pulled away from it briefly, and thus able to think) that this was what all classics should be like: innovative, original, and so believable that when a character is huddled around himself, freezing, you feel like you should go grab a blanket.

It is truly sad that this is the only novel Miss Laura Argiri has ever written, because her writing truly is prose - her sentences are so lovely, and paint such vivid pictures in one's head, that after reading it I find I have to wait before reading anything else, because nothing else stands up to it.

Long after I finished reading this book for the first time, images and quotes from it remained lodged firmly in my head. And while in lesser hands some plots twists could have been rendered unbelievable, in the hands of this amazing author, it never once occurs to you to stop believing. She is just that good.

I've never before encountered a book that moved me so deeply, that inspired and comforted and pushed me like this one does. Reading a novel this jaw-droppingly compelling and flawlessly executed felt like a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

I picked this book up at a secondhand bookstore, and now, stumbling upon it feels like discovering a priceless treasure.

Which is basically what I did.

If you like to stretch, entertain, and pamper your mind, by all means, read this book. If you prefer to live a terribly deprived life, well, then, I can't stop you. ... Weirdo. ^_~

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars FLIGHT OF FANCY, July 22, 2000

By 

Drew Brainiard "watchword" (Buffalo, NY) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The God in Flight (Paperback)

Eighteen years is a long time to labor on a novel. Possibly too long; by its completion, two different people will have worked on it. Which might explain some of the odd lapses in narrative, and emotional disconnects in Argiri's magnum opus.

Yet what a beautiful, beautiful book! Written in sumptuous Victorian style, reminiscent of Wharton or James, Argiri tells the tale of a 19th Century illicit love affair between Klionarios, an ascetic Yale art professor, and Simion Satterwhite, a precocious scholarship student who embodies Klionarios's artistic vision.

THE GOD IN FLIGHT is filled with lovely, long sensuous passages, such as when the traumatized Simion wakens in the professor's house: "The table by his bed held a tray, upon which there were an ice bucket filled with melting snow around a pitcher of what proved to be orange juice, a glass, a bell, and a silver plate of grapes. He took two grapes and savored their sweet-tart astringency. This room was like some chamber of temptation in a fairy tale, so apt it was, so suited; it was as if someone who knew everything about colors and fabrics and furniture had climbed inside his head and found out what he would like best, even before he knew himself."

No matter that the effects of Reconstruction and Emancipation are not addressed here. This is romance with a capital "R." A passionate and lyrical novel (though a bit silly), every winter I turn to its comforting literary conventions, just as surely as I return to flannel sheets and schnapps in my cocoa. But it is a strange novel, brushing over what should surely have been pivotal moments in the developing relationship of its protagonists, yet lingering lovingly on the thoughts of side characters. For me, there is really not enough plot, and the novel fails to adequately explore the central characters--and Argiri's characters are most definitely book people and not real people--but they are appealing and memorable nevertheless.

The most dismaying aspect of THE GOD IN FLIGHT is the realization that if it took Argiri nearly twenty years to write this, how long will it take for her next novel?

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars brilliant, January 20, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The God in Flight (Paperback)

A few years I ago I saw this book in a dutch bookstore. It looked beautiful with that magnificent cover and I started to read the first words, and it took me off right away. Ever since that time a few things happened: 1) it changed my life 2) it lies beside my bed, so that I sometimes can read passages of the book again 3) I haven't read a better book ever since this one. It's really very very good!