Hours [Paperback]

Michael Cunningham (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 7, 1999

Winner of the 1999 Pulitzer and Pen/Faulkner prizes, The Hours is a daring and deeply affecting novel inspired by the life and work of Virginia Woolf. A passionate, profound and haunting story of love and inheritance, hope and despair. Exiled in Richmond in the 1920s, taken from her beloved Bloomsbury and lovingly watched over by her husband Leonard, Virginia Woolf struggles to tame her rebellious mind and make a start on her new novel. In the brooding heat of 1940s Los Angeles, a young wife and mother yearns to escape the claustrophobia of suburban domesticity and read her precious copy of Mrs Dalloway. And in New York in the 1990s, Clarissa Vaughan steps out of her smart Greenwich Village apartment and goes shopping for flowers for the party she is giving in honour of her life-long friend Richard, an award-winning poet whose mind and body are being ravaged by AIDS. These are the characters in Michael Cunningham's exquisite and deeply moving novel, which takes Woolf's life and work as inspiration for a meditation on artistic behaviour, failure, love and madness. Moving effortlessy across the decades and between England and America, Cunningham's elegant, haunting prose explores the pain and trauma of creativity and the immutable relationship between writer and reader.

Editorial Reviews

Review

'The Hours is a book which heightens the perception of the reader. Cunningham's craftmanship is overwheming.' Robert Farren, Sunday Independent * 'An extremely moving, original and memorable novel' Hermione Lee, TLS * 'Engrossing, imaginative and humane.' Richard Francis, Observer

About the Author

Michael Cunningham was raised in Los Angeles and now lives in New York. His first novel A Home at the End of the World was published in 1990. and his second Flesh and Blood in 1995. His work has been published in the New Yorker and Best American Short Stories 1989.

Product Details

• Paperback: 240 pages
• Publisher: Harpercollins Pb (October 7, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1841150355
• ISBN-13: 978-1841150352
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 5 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #672,862 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Michael Cunningham is the author of the novels A Home at the End of the World, Flesh and Blood, The Hours (winner of the Pen/Faulkner Award and the Pulitzer Prize), and Specimen Days. He lives in New York.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Inspired by Mrs. Dalloway, but all Cunningham, September 14, 2005

By 

Debbie Lee Wesselmann (the Lehigh Valley, PA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 50 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (2008 HOLIDAY TEAM)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Hours (Paperback)

I can't believe I put off reading Michael Cunningham's THE HOURS for this long. This spectacularly written novel resonates with emotion and insight as it follows the relatively ordinary details of the lives of three women separated by decades. Each woman lives a single day here, each is haunted by the novel MRS. DALLOWAY. Virginia Woolf is preparing to write the novel in the midst of unsettling thoughts and surroundings. 50's housewife Laura Brown finds refuge in the book as she prepares for her husband's birthday and finds herself tempted by thoughts of death. Clarissa Vaughan has been nicknamed Mrs. Dalloway by her closest friend, the dying poet Richard, for whom she is about to throw a party. The three stories converge thematically; two are brought together by a shared character.

You don't need to read Woolf's MRS. DALLOWAY to appreciate this book because Cunningham has constructed a moving tale that stands on its own. Although a knowledge of Woolf's novel reveals the layers the author has carefully constructed, there is much here to enjoy without that frame of reference. The language is stunning, and the sentiments even more so. Surprisingly, Virginia Woolf is the strongest character despite her iconic place in literature, with Clarissa almost as well drawn. Laura is less memorable. Some of the minor characters appear with clarity while others seem tacked on, there only to support the ties to Woolf's novel. The homosexual characters (most notably Clarissa and Richard, with fleeting impulses from Laura and Virginia) are treated with affection and respect.

THE HOURS is a short, easily readable book, although you shouldn't - and most won't want to - breeze through it. I recommend this book for a general readership.