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    South Wind (Barnes & Noble Library of Essential Reading)
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    South Wind (Barnes & Noble Library of Essential Reading)
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    South Wind (Barnes & Noble Library of Essential Reading)
    Ebook538 pages8 hours

    South Wind (Barnes & Noble Library of Essential Reading)

    By Norman Douglas and Bruce F. Murphy

    3.5/5

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    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    South Wind depicts a group of eccentric and even scandalous characters wiling away their time in a sunny Mediterranean resort. The novel takes place on Nepenthe, Douglas's thinly veiled version of Capri, an island retreat for pleasure-seekers since Roman times. In classical mythology, “nepenthe” was a medicine that caused one to forget melancholy and suffering; Douglas' comical duchesses, American millionaires, and expatriate freethinkers forget not only suffering, but conventional morality and even ordinary discretion. In the series of witty conversations that make up much of the novel, the characters analyze (and mock) religion, science, morality, progress, and the legacies of classical civilization. The novel spoke to the young, rebellious, and cynical generation that was scarred by the experience of World War I, and influenced younger English writers such as Aldous Huxley and Graham Greene. 
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBarnes & Noble
    Release dateSep 1, 2009
    ISBN9781411431584
    Unavailable
    South Wind (Barnes & Noble Library of Essential Reading)
    Author

    Norman Douglas

    Norman Douglas (Bregenz, 1868-Capri, 1952) es conocido principalmente por sus libros de viajes y por la novela Viento del sur (1917).

    Read more from Norman Douglas

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    Reviews for South Wind (Barnes & Noble Library of Essential Reading)

    3.5/5

    46 ratings4 reviews

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    • 4/5
      South Wind is a unique novel. Rather than presenting a traditional plot it seems like an olio or mixture of lectures and observations on various, often obscure, aspects of geology, climatology, history, morality, religion, and folklore, among other topics. The author's use of articulate characters confined to a restricted setting allows for ample airing of views and recalls the methods of English novelist Thomas Love Peacock, whose country house novels were once very popular.South Wind’s setting itself becomes a character as the island Nepenthe, which is not to be found on a map, comes alive as the narrative progresses. The literary reference is to the magical potion given to Helen by Polydamna the wife of the noble Egyptian Thon; it quells all sorrows with forgetfulness; figuratively, nepenthe means "that which chases away sorrow" (Odyssey, Book 4, v. 219–221). However, it is usually considered a fictional version of the isle of Capri, about which Douglas wrote a series of scholarly pamphlets and upon which he was living when he completed South Wind. It reminded me of Shirley Hazzard's literary meditation, Greene on Capri in which she also captured the essence of the island. She also noted the friendship between Graham Greene and Douglas in the late 1940's when Greene first began to frequent the isle, "he had the company, when he chose, of a handful of lively and literary resident compatriots . . . [and] had enjoyed the last effulgence of Norman Douglas . . ."(Greene on Capri, p 47)Douglas did not deny his novel’s debt to a real location but insisted that Ischia, Ponza, and the Lipari Islands (all lying off the southwest coast of Italy) were the actual sources for Nepenthe’s natural scenery. Douglas even incorporated a version of his observations regarding the pumice stone industry of the Lipari Islands, the subject of one of his first publications. Douglas’s creation had deep roots in his own experience—the details of which he drew upon heavily.The novel’s characters are the result of much the same observational mode which allows the reader, if he is willing, to gradually develop an acquaintance with the place through the idiosyncrasies of the characters. An example may suffice: "Mr. Keith was a perfect host. He had the right word for everybody; his infectious conviviality made them all straightaway at their ease. The overdressed native ladies, the priests and officials moving about in prim little circles, were charmed with his affable manner 'so different from most Englishmen';" (p 131)One or two characters may be based on historically obscure acquaintances of Douglas, but others are little more than personifications of facets of their author’s own personality. The voluble Mr. Keith is most likely a spokesman for Douglas’s hedonistic views, and Mr. Eames and Count Caloveglia represent Douglas’s scholarly and antiquarian interests. All are perfectly adequate mouthpieces, but none emerges as rounded or particularly memorable outside of the group.Several British writers of Greene’s generation were directly influenced by Douglas in general and by South Wind in particular. Aldous Huxley’s satirical novels Crome Yellow (1921, in which Douglas appears as the character Scrogan), Antic Hay (1923), and Point Counter Point (1928) bear its stamp. Greene himself generally wrote books of a darker character, but his lighter comic novel Travels with My Aunt (1969) bears similarities to South Wind. Douglas's erudite yet pleasant style reminds me a bit of Lawrence Durrell. Needless to say this is an engaging novel with plenty of interesting characters that more than offset the lack of a robust plot.
    • 3/5
      Not sure why this work is so highly rated.
    • 2/5
      I read this in January 1952. I found it stupid in its "daring." It is akin to Cabell's Jurgen, and almost as dull. Heard, the bishop, after a stay on the island of Nepenthe (Capri) ends up approving murder in a particular case. The whole picture of ridicule at all sorts of things struck me as only inane.
    • 2/5
      I have to admit that, in my ignorance, I had not heard of Mr. Douglas until someone kindly recommended his work. I genuinely appreciate anyone offering a new author and so, I feel a bit of a heel to review the work unfavourably. I draw solace from the knowledge that the book, written in 1917, has survived longer than I am likely so to do and, has more supporters. My little gripe will cause incredibly small ripples.All that said, I found this book a real trial. The book is of its age: it is a truth, unnecessary to express, that the white British male is superior to Johnny Foreigner. The humour is of the superior type which, personally, I find grates. I will admit that this is another book which I did not complete but, after 75 pages, I felt that my head would explode were another paragraph of this opus seep into my subconscious.