Summer Challenge '08: The Sea by John Banville

I read The Sea a little while back and had only a medium reaction to it. I felt I must be missing something, especially now in retrospect, since I have really taken such a liking to many other of Banville's works. Since I have also already read The Road for the other discussion, and don't have to read it again so urgently, it sounds like I'll pull The Sea back off the shelf and reread it to join this discussion in a little while. I'm sure I'll get more out of the reread and also the discussion, so I'm looking forward to it.
See you soon. :)

I read The Sea 6 months ago. I found Banville's prose rather elegant but somehow the story in itself still came out dull and tedious, just a profusion of ramblings.





______________________________
I may be negligent, foolish, and fearful.
In every one of these no man is free,
... These, my lord,
Are such allowed infirmities that honesty
Is never free of.
-- The Winter's Tale by William Shakespeare

Now, I've been lost in the story

I am currently reading it at the moment. bout 1/4 the way.
Nightie i'll send you your copy this weekend.

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Originally Posted by Antiquarian

I liked The Sea a lot, but I liked some of Banville's other books more - Shroud, and the trilogy - Book of Evidence, Ghosts, and Athena.

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Yes, Antiquarian, I've read those also, plus The Untouchable, all in one very happy binge. And maybe they are all different from The Sea in each having more of a story, or more action, or more dramatic conflict, or even just more characters -- all of the things that we usually see and expect in a novel.

I've now finished my reread (second read) and have learned much more about the literary structure of the novel and have properly placed many more details of the story. But still I feel that it will take once more through it -- quickly, now that I have it all marked up -- to get it all properly sorted out into a linear narrative.

So, it is definitely different, and on this third go-through I'll be looking -- I might say desperately looking -- for a theme or point to the whole story or to Morden's whole rumination. But, overall, it has been a fascinating book to read slowly and to absorb. Reading fast, I suspect one might miss all the turns in a very winding road.

Some puzzles I just won't allow to defeat me. :)

I read The Sea about a year and a half ago, it was the first Banville and the real reason I picked it up was a blurb on the cover...

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"John Banville is the heir to Nabokov' - The Sunday Telegraph".

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Well, who could pass that up! :D

Have to reread as I can't remember details only the outline.
Back later.

Finished reading and I cannot say I liked it much.

Banville's writing is beautiful at times but mostly I thought it was laborious and somewhat distracting due to his tendency for long and complicated sentences.

At the moment, I don't want to go into details not to spoil for others but the ending was disappointing for me as well.

I'm practically finished, I am loving it more the second time around, and wonder if the second reading is really the charm. I did enjoy it the first time around, but this time around it is more revelatory.
The way Banville slips back and forth between the four time frames is easy and seamless.

Scheherazade,
I didn't find it laborious a bit, the detail was necessary for me to understand "Max" and his motivations. I don't want to post anything that will spoil it for those not yet finished, but I thought every detail was necessary.
Now when for the first time reading The Untouchable I was stymied by the 5 different names everyone seemed to have, but picked it up about a year later and could not put it down.

I've read, um....the trilogy, Shroud, The Untouchable and the Benjamin Black enteries, at least the Quirks. All vintage Banville.

Sounds like the makings for a good discussion shaping up! :)

Argh! Have to get replacement copies! pages started going out of sequance and doubling up when i got to 85.
Soz Nightie! looks like you copy is too. good thing i hadnt posted it!

Okay so i've finished the book. it was a fairly good book. wouldnt say absolutely wonderful.

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Originally Posted by Scheherazade

Started reading it: Finding the initial flashbacks a little confusing as it seems like the story keeps going back and forth between 3 different time periods... but story is intriguing.

And I see that the poll is divided between "Waste of time" and "Good book."... Interesting! :)

Didn't know it was a Man Booker Prize Winner...

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Started it today on the way to work, or did I start t yetsrday ? :confused: ahh well anyway THANKS NIAMH! ...I am finding it rather hard going actually and confusing, but thats good in a way for me becuase usually Id just inhale a book, and Im short on books supply anyway.

There was something thatdid make me raise an eyebrow or 2 , he says that on theday he met Chole grace he was 10 or 11, and yet he was hoping that rose would loose her towel, and has 'humid dreams' about Mrs Grace.
I just thought it was a bit weird is all- or have I got the age wrong?
:confused:

I will be starting this novel by the weekend. I hope there are still people up for a good discussion.

I started. Read about fifteen pages and then realized nothing registered. :lol: I'll have to start again. The language doesn't seem hard or anything like that, but for some reason it's not sinking in.