Jiní čtenáři do komentářů napsali, že jazyk byl až moc květnatý, a tudíž se kniha špatně četla. Mně připadal květnatý tak akorát, abych se mohla dokonale naladit na atmosféru doby, ve které byli muži gentlemani a nosili kloubouky a vycházkové hole (podotýkám však, že jsem dílo poslouchala jako audioknihu).
Jednoduchá zápletka, ale přitom velmi zajímavá perspektiva: hlavní postava nemá jméno, jediné, co o ní víme, se týká víceméně jejího snoubence, kromě toho jejíma očima sledujeme vztah mileneckého párů, kterého se naše telegrafistka účastní spíše nepřímo, mnoho věcí si jen představuje a vymýšlí si různé teorie. Když se v závěru dozvídá, jak vše bylo, je z tohoto poznání v šoku. Na mě byl závěr trochu nevýrazný, i když nepopírám, že nepřinesl několik podnětů ohledně některých postav. Co se mi na knize líbilo nejvíce, je právě prokreslená psychologie postav.

A mystifying read. Charming until the last word, yet the only relief, resolution, result I felt at the end was simply that it was over.

Excited to dig into this novel through my research, but as a whole, I did not enjoy it too much.

how does he know so well what it's like to have a shitty job?

Is it crack? Is it crack that you smoke, Henry James? It's like every third sentence is a code or an inside joke only known to him. He was also way too fond of using 'literally' (incorrectly, I might add).

Maybe it's due to the fact that I read this while having high fever, but this didn't work for me. At all. Which is unsurprising considering I've liked pretty much nothing of Henry James ever since I tried to get into his writings as a teenager.

The way I see it, Henry James prides himself in having a prose lacking in clarity and conciseness. Now, the idea here (I think) is to do the modernist thing of unfolding a scene to take a look at it from as many different angles as possible. One sentence is not enough to paint a scene, we need two paragraphs per observation it seems.

I don't know if it's me disagreeing with the execution of the latter or if I truly don't lack in enough self-awareness to pretend to like this long-winded stream of meaningless words, but the point is, as much as I like experimentation, I rather read a short story when I can read a short story and a novel when I can read a novel. And this story is, at heart, a short story, exceeding its natural length by almost half of its entire size.

I cannot pretend to have liked this or to find redeeming qualities in it. There surely are, but I'm having a hard time coming to their aid at the end of this review. I just loathed it, all of it.