Prater Violet is a short, sharp read. I think I may have read it a bit too fast, actually. Isherwood's prose is charming and economical, and he does a good job keeping the story's smaller players distinguishable. I loved how, in addition to the central interactions between Bergmann and the fictionalized Isherwood, a whole world behind this brief story is hinted at, is fed to the reader sideways-- the further vast workings of the film industry, the interior lives of each technician and secretary, the hint of the past with Ashmeade, and most hugely, the hulking terror of Hitler and World War II. In general, it's quick and light and contemplative, but the story really opens up and swallows you at the end.

Well, gotta go read more Isherwood now. ( )

Kristen Menger-Anderson rec

This novella is only the second book of Isherwood’s that I’ve read, and I enjoyed it even more than the first, Goodbye to Berlin. It’s an interesting feature of his work that he blurs the line between memoir and fiction.
As in Goodbye to Berlin, in Prater Violet Isherwood writes in the first person as a character named Christopher Isherwood and bases the tale on his own experience, in this case, his first foray into film. Nevertheless, it is a novel that reads like a novel. It has the freedom and snappy dialogue of the best fiction.
Friedrich Bergmann, Viennese intellectual director, is a memorably-depicted figure. The character of Isherwood is only slightly less successful, perhaps because one has seen the type of the effete university-educated product of a middle-class home unable to act on his sympathy for the down-trodden before (most recently, in my case, in the author's Berlin collection). Still, this portrait is an interesting variation on the theme.
While some of the supporting characters are sketchy, others are vivid; I think of Lawrence the technician, Chatsworth, the producer, and Ashmeade, Cambridge poet-turned-studio intriguer.
The juxtaposition of the self-important, insular, crisis-ridden studio and the percolating instability of central Europe under the shadow of Fascism works for me. I was glad that the one was not clumsily portrayed as the counterpart to the other. The points of contact Isherwood evokes are sufficient, and deftly handled. A very good read. ( )

A truly delightful read, with enticing insight into Art and the process of creation in relation to Man, the roles he plays under cold, artificial lights, the paths he moves along, and the chill mathematics of show-business and of the falling dominoes of history that tamper with the artistic temperament.
Gripping questions related to the human condition such as love and friendship are explored in more depth on a few pages than they usually are in thick volumes.
Bittersweet truths about who we might be and what we are doing with ourselves often come in deliciously manageable bite-sized chunks. ( )

The last five pages alone make this a worthwhile read. Pairs well with Fitzgerald's The Last Tycoon. ( )