Time in Its Flight

by Susan Fromberg Schaeffer

Follows the lives of the family of Dr. John Steele and his wife, Edna, detailing their loves and their confrontations with small-town tyranny, nature's ravages, and disease

Genres: Fiction, Historical Fiction

Hardcover

First published January 1, 1978

About the author

Susan Fromberg Schaeffer was an American novelist and poet who was a Professor of English at Brooklyn College for more than thirty years. She won numerous national writing awards and contributed book reviews for the New York Times.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Susan_Fr...

Reviews

[Edmond Osborn · Rating 3 out of 5]

I've got boxes (and BOXES) of old paperbacks I've never gotten around to reading; I'd been meaning to read this one, from the late '70's, for a long time and finally got around to it. It's a mammoth account of New England domestic life during the middle of the nineteenth century - I can't recall a novel where the author has obviously done so much research into the details of the day-to-day existence of her characters. It's the story of John and Edna Steele, and John's sister Aunt Ten; they're real salt of the earth types and we follow them through forty years of coping with hardships (rabid dogs, diptheria epidemics, raging bouts of cabin fever during those long Vermont winters,) as they work (John is a doctor) raise a family and spend long passages musing about time, death and fate. This is a sober, thoughtful book; there's no melodrama or adventure here; just an accumulation of incidents in the lives of mostly admirable characters. The long philosophical sections are likely to put most readers off; this thousand-pager is at least a couple of hundred too long, but I'm not sorry I finally read it.

[Arlene Allen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Back when books over 300 pages long didn't scare me - a guge, gripping, memorable family saga about a one of a kind family. I actually read this twice and own two copies of it.

[Michele · Rating 5 out of 5]

Big sweeping family epic set in New England, spanning the mid-19th to mid-20th centuries.

Law, medicine, religion, science, and philosophy are blended together with farming, miscarriages, madness, epidemics, and cats into a complex and intriguing tapestry that is full of humor and love for the humanity of its sprawling, feisty, contradictory, curious cast. There isn't a plot, per se, but the overarching theme is right there in the title: Time, and how it flows (so rapidly!) through and into and around us and everything/everyone that we know and love. Apart from the fact that the family has, apparently, more money than they know what to do with, the book is like a big slice of real life because only real-life things happen: wedding and funerals, births and deaths, misunderstandings and reconciliations. The characters grow and change, they discover things about each other (and themselves), there is joy and grief and hope as well as confusion and rage and fear.

Although the book is a doorstop, it is never pedestrian or dull. Schaeffer's skill with language is truly superb, whether dialogue or description or simple narration. I was constantly delighted with a skilled turn of phrase, an original metaphor, a word-picture so detailed and vivid I could see it before my eyes.

And every character, no matter how unpleasant or unlikable they may seem at first, it turns out has something unexpected about them that makes you rethink your initial assessment. If the theme is Time, then the moral may well be "Do not be too quick to judge." As in real life, time may reveal a different side of a person, lead you to change your thoughts about a question.

[Ellen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the first book I've read by Susan Fromberg Schaeffer, and I enjoyed it very much to my best recollection. It's been quite a long time since I've read it, but I remember being impressed with the writer's ability to move the plot along and delineate her characters. Schaeffer's style flows nicely, and I think most people who like books that have a psychological aspect to them will enjoy this book.

I plan on reading other books by this same author and hope they are as well-written as was this one.

[Susan · Rating 1 out of 5]

mid 1800's Vermont - - -no good

[Betsy Maher · Rating 3 out of 5]

I thought it was O.K. but a bit tedious.

[Scottie]

I read this in the 1970s, maybe 80s, and loved it. Thought I might give it another read, but can't quite get into it this time around. Maybe later I'll read it again.