Customer Reviews

The Vision of Emma Blau

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(10)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

A great piece of work. Hegi has done a fine job! I read Stones from the River last year and loved it so it was great to revisit the American side of this family. Although, stylistically "Vision..." is not as sophisticated as "Stones..." it is still astutely observed. AS a new immigrant to the US I identified with Stephan Blau as he forges a life for himself in a new country. The issues raised re: the immigrant experience ar spot on: the language barrier, the feeling of belonging neither here nor there, the problems of assimilation and the cost of retaining one's loyalties to one's homeland are all explored. The characterisations for the most part are good - I loved the stream of consciousness episodes - while the characters' are acting their true hidden motives are being revealed, The Wasserburg contains a wonderfully eclectic cast of individuals spanning all generations and it is perhaps the central character. We are witness to its inevitable decay as Emma is released from her "vision" This novel is a sweeping view of America and shows us how love and tradition can have such a multi-generational impact. Hegi brings a wonderfully luminescent quality to her writing and she maintains a startling capacity for detail. A great work by a great writer and it has made me want to revisit Stones From the Rover all over again!

Ursula Hegi has always been an insightful, thoughtful,respected author. With THE VISION OF EMMA BLAU, her reputation as oneof the finest contemporary fiction writers is sealed. A German native, her work crosses any possible cultural borders --- every book is a tightly woven exultation of life as experienced by human beings, regardless of sex, creed, or any other distinguishing factor. She is, quite simply, a marvelous storyteller.

THE VISION OF EMMA BLAU is the story of Stefan Blau, a 13-year-old boy who flees his small town in Burgdorf, Germany. He comes to the USA in search of a chronic vision that haunts him --- it is a vision of a small child he hasn't seen before and a place he hasn't ever visited. The book travels from Germany to America and covers nearly 100 years. Emma, his granddaughter, is the girl of his dream; his sprawling apartment house, the place of his dream. Wasserburg, Stefan's estate, falls into a slow fade and parallels the evolution of American society. The book tells the life of the Blau family, but it truly reflects the experiences of all families that have lived and prospered and suffered throughout World War I and World War II.

Immigrant life in America is not a new subject. But somehow the beautiful prose Hegi utilizes brings Stefan's story into full bloom and makes us feel like we are reliving that period of history all over again, through a truly new perspective. I think this is a very difficult feat to pull off --- but the vision itself presents a framework that keeps us on the edge of our seats: When will Stefan's vision become clear? Who is the girl? Where is this place? How does it all tie into the life he creates for himself anew in the New World, then passes onto the generations of German-American descendants that come after him? THE VISION OF EMMA BLAU is a remarkably poignant story, far-reaching in its scope and irrevocably heartbreaking and heart soaring in its portrait of the growing up of America.

I would heartily recommend THE VISION OF EMMA BLAU to anyone who is part of a family, who wonders about how we all affect each other, our country, ourselves, with each of our experiences, as well as how the world around us affects our lives. These are important questions about life as we knew it in the twentieth century and provides plenty of indications as to how these times will affect us in the new millennium. Congratulations to Hegi for another affecting, considerate novel. What could have been a tired retelling of generational love transcends sentimentality to become a rousing, deeply evocative tale through which we can rediscover America.

--- Reviewed by Jana Siciliano

The start of this book about Stefan Blau and his wives is very intriguing -- I would have liked the book to be all about them. The characters of his children were boring and his grandchildren even more so. There were just too many characters over such a long period of time that I stopped caring about any of them -- especially the house, which was much too central for my tastes. I was actually rooting for its collapse by the time Emma was around (my least favorite character). The beautiful style of Heigi's prose is about the only thing that kept me going to the end. A big disappointment since "Stones from the River" is one of my all time favorites -- one I recommend to all my friends. I would never recommend this one to any of them. I gave it three stars because it was not terrible, and like stated above, her prose is wonderful to read. I just had really high hopes for it after "Stones" -- compared only to it, this is a 2 or less.

Ursula Hegi uses her poetic prose and emotional insight once again to create a world in which by exploring the lives of others we learn more about our own. Hegi's previous book, Stones from the River, used the dramatic backdrop of Hitler's Germany and the life of a young dwarf to explore themes of belonging, exclusion, alienation, and "status in the tribe". In The Vision of Emma Blau, Hegi creates five generations of characters through which she explores human desire, how desire manifests"~ itself in our lives, and the impact of those manifestations on those around us. to provide a means to explore our humanity, then this book is fine art indeed.

This is a beautifully written book. If you enjoyed Stones From the River, this book is for you. Ms. Hegi makes her characters come alive! I could picture everyone in the apartment house. I highly recommend this book.

Even though this book carries some of the STONES story, it lacks the rich characters, the intense personal pain, even the drama of conflict.

It's a generational story beginning with the life of German immagrant Stefan Blau and ending with his middle-aged granddaughter, Emma. The connection through the years is the apartment monstrosity Stefan built in small-town New Hampshire, a symbol of his success in America. The Wasserburg is built with money borrowed, but never paid back, from his wealthy in-laws. It is this conflict that sets the story in motion--a story of a house destined to bring pain to succeeding generations of Blaus. Using the house to cheat others is the only theme I could find. Stefan's third wife, Helene, cheats her step-children of their inheritance. Helene's son, Robert, cheats his half-brother and sister. Robert's daughter, Emma, cheats her mother and brother. As interesting as this sounds, it was quite dull because it lacked drama. And there was no drama because the characters were not developed. Unlike the memorable characters of STONES FROM THE RIVER, the ensemble of VISION fails to stir compassion from the reader.

After enjoying Stones From The River, I was delighted to find that Ursula Hegi had written another book. She has a gift for character development that allows us to understand motives and actions from a human, rather than an ethnic, perspective. I was particularly touched by the son, Robert, who seemed to fully understand his dysfunctional marriage and eating habits and yet was unable to alter them. This book is an insight into family dynamics and the added immigration effect that is worth reading.

I read this book after reading "Stones from the River" and was a little disappointed. Hegi is a wonderful storyteller and she has a gift of writing poetically sensible sentences which strike at your heart and make you see things in her characters which you recognise in yourself. However, I can't help but feel that this was an over-ambitious work. The parts where it deals with Stefan Blau's attempt to adapt to life in America as an immigrant are not well explored, and when the novel unfolds, the introduction of the various characters becomes a tad confusing and you get the feeling that you're reading alot more about characters you don't care about only because they fall into the correct time frame. I would rather she had concentrated on characters from the first and second generation, as their lives were neglected towards the last third of the novel, leaving a sense of dissatisfaction in the reader. The writing of "Stones of the River" was much more in-depth and the fact that the story was seen through the eyes of a main protagonist managed to give the novel a degree of centrality which was severely lacking in "The Vision of Emma Blau". At the end of the novel, there is a sense that you have read everything, but have escaped the pertinent points. This was an average novel, but its resources, setting, people and themes could have been worked into something much more powerful. I still look forward to Hegi's other offerings.

While I did enjoy this book, I felt it was much more powerful in the beginning and began to lose steam about 1/2 way through.Hegi started to weave a colorful tapestry of characters but then abruptly stopped developing them, characters were introduced and then barely written about.It almost felt like she left the door open for a sequel because so many characters were left "dangling." Instead of being a GREAT book, it was merely a pleasant read.

I read "The Vision of Emma Blau" immediately after reading "Stones from the River," and I was as enthralled by the characters in this book as I was in the first. The occasional mention of characters from the other book made this story a wonderful blending of the two, peopled with characters you feel you know intimately. Another case of not wanting the book to end. I was a bit disappointed in the ending, however. I wanted to know more, a lot more!