Antonietta

by John Hersey

A saga of a magnificent violin, Antonietta, named after a beautiful woman who was the inspiration of Antonio Stradivari's later years. As Hersey brings Mozart, Berlioz, and Stravinsky to life, he offers us a marvelous celebration of the changing character and eternal art and power of music.

Genres: Fiction, Historical Fiction, Music, Historical, American, Italy, Novels

324 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1991

About the author

John Richard Hersey, a Pulitzer Prize-winning American writer, earliest practiced the "new journalism," which fuses storytelling devices of the novel with nonfiction reportage. A 36-member panel under the aegis of journalism department of New York University adjudged account of Hersey of the aftermath of the atomic bomb, dropped on Hiroshima, Japan, as the finest piece of journalism of the 20th century.

Reviews

[Martha · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful novel about the life of a Strativarius. I was enchanted all the way through -- possibly because I am often fascinated by the "lives" of things. Anyone who has seen "The Red Violin" (which I once thought was based on Hersey's novel) has an idea of what this novel is like, though the novel (IMO) is sweeter, the violin's "lives" more intriguing.

[Maggie · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best surprises ever in a book - I got this nearly free at a used book sale and had no idea the gem that I'd picked up.

[Tingmeplz · Rating 4 out of 5]

The novel Antonietta by John Hersey was moving and captivating in a very unconventional way. I found that it deepened my understanding of music to a certain extent and refreshed my belief in the power that it can have over people. In the novel, Antonietta was a violin created by Antonio Stradivari out of the passion he experienced when he fell in love with a beautiful widow named Antonia. He carved a cupid in its tailpiece, symbolizing Antonietta’s ability to make people fall deeply in love, if only for a moment as they listened to her music.
The story progressed as Antonietta fell into the care of different musicians, and she seemed to stir up the deepest feelings they had experienced in love. It drew my attention in with short clip-like stories of different glimpses throughout history and music from the perspective of a violin. As intended, I found this book romantic in a different way, in that it combined love and music together and was also uniquely sexual.
The character of Antonietta was as quite lifelike for being an inanimate object, but the vivacity and dynamo of the other characters more than made up for this; with the exception of the last section which I found rather disappointing character-wise. Other than the wondrously bland Spenser Ham and the other characters following his time in history, the rest of Hersey’s creations neared unforgettable in my mind.
I especially enjoyed the contrast between sections, and how each was carefully written in a completely different fashion from the last. It felt like reading five stories of almost equal timbre all bound together through the connectivity of the main character Antonietta into one splendid work of musical art. If you are a musician, have studied classical music at one time, or play the violin, you will find this novel especially fulfilling.
Whether or whether not you can read the excerpts of music printed throughout the novel, there are many colourful quirks and likeable things to enjoy for everybody. The Author’s style of writing was very poetic and seemed to lull me into a pleasant trance while describing in detail the music emanating from the instrument and the powerful effect it had on every person who encountered it, and is also charmingly provocative of the imagination.
Something that I really appreciated about this book was that it was not just about a violin. It seemed to me to have a deeper meaning about music that comes from the soul, and how powerful it is when shared with the world. So much care was put into the creation of this one object that it became a legacy. Every song written on it reflected the passion that Antonietta had within her, and the inspiration and meaning it left its listeners with I believe, is anything but fictional. As a musician I truly enjoyed this book and found that it left me with not only inspiration, but direct knowledge and broadened my view on the art of music and its purpose in the world. Something else I liked was that it really looked into the process of writing. It tells the story of each artist and how they manifested internal ideas and feeling into music, creating something real for the world. This was done in many different ways and inspired my own songwriting through the different characters and the way their creative minds formed music in very different circumstances for various purposes.
Antoinetta was the cupid of all instruments, wooing the hearts and souls of all who heard her voice. Do you believe in love at first song?

[Bea · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really did enjoy this book. First, the author is a violinist and therefore was familiar with his subject - Antonietta, the violin made by Stadivarius. He included history and provenance as part of the story. He used five acts - each set in a different time - to trace the journey of this one violin. The Intermezzos were the tying thread that resolved all the issues of each act so that you began the next act with a sense of completion. Usually the tying thread was the summation of what had happened to the main characters of the act, ie Mozart, Stravinsky. Yes, he used known characters in the music world for the most part as the main character of each act. Each act is also written in a different style. One was mostly the form of letters between the character and his father (Mozart's act); another told the story in the voices of three characters who wrote a production (Stravinsky's act); and a third told the story in the form of a script.

[Karin · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.3 stars--average of the five parts of this story which ranged from 1.5 to 5.

This novel is almost like a series of interconnected short stories that gives a fictional rendering of the provenance of a real Stradavari violin, Antonietta. This was the first violin of a redesigned type and was the advent of his golden era of violin making (but not one of the ones worth $10 million for various reasons.)

The stories ranged for me from excellent to boring and annoying. This is the first novel I've read by Hersey, but since I recognize some of his other titles from my parents' shelves (before they cleared most of them out) my parents read some of his books, and it's possible that some of my grandparents read him. Some parts are funny, particularly the section featuring letters written by Mozart (when a certain musician owned it.) Some sections were prose, one was epistolary, one was prose subdivided into movements (at least part of it was) and one was mostly written like a screen play (one of my least favourite ones.)

[Eugenea Pollock · Rating 5 out of 5]

I find it difficult to do justice to this book because it is different in so many ways from most others I have read. But I will make a start with a quote that describes the time when an orchestral conductor first raises the baton--"A long pause to let silence creep like a hungry cat into the hall." When Hersey figuratively lowers the baton, his biography of a fictional legendary Strad progresses through five major (and even more minor) time periods, each one delivered in a different literary format, from a traditional narrative (parts 1 & 3) to a collection of letters (part 2) to a shifting POV perspective (part 4) to a screenplay (part 5). This sequence of five separate but sequentially related stories may not work for every reader, but I was fine with it--though I do wonder if Hersey had an overarching reason for it that escaped me.
Music is often central to the forward motion of the plot, so much so that I frequently took a reading "intermission" to google the composition and listen to it. Part 2, set in 1778, referenced Mozart and contemporaries; part 3, in 1830, Berlioz et al.; and part 4, in 1918, Stravinsky et al. Parts 1 (1699 birth of Antonietta) and 5 (1989) were not driven in the same way, but this device added a dimension to the book few authors can pull off. Hersey did so admirably.
And the "personality" of Antonietta is unforgettable--the spell of this seductress will linger in my memory long after I turned the last page.

[Carolyn · Rating 3 out of 5]

Detailed description of the making of a fine violin by Stradivarius and it's part over the following years in the hands of famous musicians. The care and perfection required in assembly was incredible.
As a pianist, there is an awesome appreciation of these projects. It reminds me of finding the piano that could be an extension of my personality. These years described connect not just the thrill of sharing beautiful compositions but also reflecting the individual artist in his recreation of each piece played. This book is not for everyone. It speaks to those who appreciate music history and the fine art of replication!

[Amreta · Rating 4 out of 5]

I wanted to give five stars to this book, but actually it will only go to the first and second chapters of the book, the Stradivari family and the 'history' of Antonietta (the lady and the violin) - and the Mozarts' (father and son) correspondence. John Hersey played a candid style in the several first chapters (especially the first two), but much to my dissapointment the next chapters, when the violin came to the 'modern world' I found the stories became less and less interesting - as if the author had lost the brilliant ideas. Nevertheless, it's still a great read, one of my favorite books.

[Rachel Pollock · Rating 2 out of 5]

I like the first section of this book a lot. I kept reading it because the subsequent four sections, I hoped I would like one of them as much as I liked the first one. However, each one annoyed me in a different way. By the time I got to the end of it, I actively hated this book. It felt kind of like having a conversation with someone about pseudo-intellectual musical history topics, and then realizing at some point in the conversation, that they were jerking off under the table.

[Hannah · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved the passion for music that came through from each new voice in the book. It read like a personal passion project that Hersey wrote just to put down his feeling for music in words. It let me experience music the way musicians want the world to hear it.

[Jacob Heartstone · Rating 2 out of 5]

This novel follows a Stradivari violin, named Antonietta, from the day of its creation through the centuries up until more or less the present time. It was played and/or listenened to by a lot of well-known classical musicians and violinists (Amadeus Mozart, Hector Berlioz, Igor Stravinsky, etc) and in the course of this novel we get to explore their journeys together. In theory, this sounds right up my alley.

The structure as well as the overall plot were a tad experimential but cool enough. I can see (and appreciate) what the author was trying to do here. However, I did not particularly care for the author's way of executing said idea.

First of all, the writing style is very, very dull and especially the first two acts/chapters were so bland they made me want to DNF repeatedly they were that badly written. Secondly, which is sth every book that is about real historical figures runs in peril of, the historical personalities that were included here did not feel quite fleshed out enough or true enough to their historic selves in my opinion.

Last but not least, the general way of describing characters and giving them personalities did not agree with me at all. I don't know why but the author made evey single male character he included a horny (heterosexual) predator and every single woman that appears throughout the narrative a mindless, easy-going idiot that only appears to be the object of the male protagonists' lust. I hate such stereotypical gender representation in fiction and frankly, just don't see the point of it.

[Lisa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hersey is reliably enjoyable for me. This is the tale of a fictional violin made by the famous Stradivarius in 1699. It travels from his hands through the centuries engaging with Mozart, Berlioz, Stravinsky and ultimately to a business mogul engaging in insider trading. Hersey's description of how the music was written and experienced is exquisite. It moved me even though I am not intimately familiar with much of music.

[cellomerl]

I recall reading this while on my honeymoon in Hawaii in Sept 2001.

[Mary Ann · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very strange 5 part story of a Stradivarius and it’s life from creation to 1989. The path of the violin was great but my weak classical music background made some of this difficult for me.

[Jacqui Robbins · Rating 3 out of 5]

I love the idea of this book. Antonietta is the favorite violin of the violin maker Stradivari, and the book follows her travels from owner to owner, through Mozart and Berlioz and Stravinsky, into the present. The book itself is structured like a symphony, with five movements and intermezzos, and Hersey uses different writing styles/formats that capture the mood of the different movements (e.g. he uses letters written back and forth to mimic the "conversation" of instruments in a symphony). When I realized that was what was going on, I was thrilled.

The first movement fascinated me. It was full of emotion and mystery and even the long descriptions of the careful creation of a violin caught my attention. The Mozart movement was funny and engaging. But by the end of the book, I was disappointed. In the end, the structure did the book in for me. Because it's a mostly true story, and because it goes in chronological order, we lose characters and, with them, our interest in what is going to happen. There's no thread, other than the violin, that carries us from the beginning, driving us to the end. And then, in the last movement, when we get to the present, we never get a satisfying ties-the-end-to-the-beginning moment. Which I want in a book, and a symphony.

[Julie · Rating 2 out of 5]

The story is told in 5 acts traverse a span of almost 300 years. The first act tells the tale of how Stradivari creates Antonietta. It is a lovely story. Then - we move forward in time to Mozart, Berlioz, Federovsky and Stravinsky and to Hollywood. Every era/person interact with Antonietta and that is how her story is unveiled. While I enjoyed the first chapter - the others would lose my attention. I think that's because the focus of those subsequent stories was no longer about the violin but rather the famous musician. And while that is a very interesting premise - those stories (for me) were mundane. Odd, right? I've read other books about pieces of art that travel through time (girl in hyacinth blue) that are much more engaging. I will say that the author is extremely gifted at writing in a variety of voices and styles that match the time period in which he is writing. That was interesting to see how the style and language would change as he move through the eras.

[Marvin · Rating 4 out of 5]

A delightful novel that traces the story of a violin through its creation by Stradivarius through ownership by violinists who were related in some way to Mozart, Bizet, & Stravinsky. The last chapter, when the violin is owned by a venture capitalist, seemed out of place, and there was not really an ending, but overall the book is a sheer delight.

[Karen · Rating 2 out of 5]

Interesting read about a violin made by the famous violin maker Stradivari and how the violin came to be named Antonietta. The book then takes you thru the centuries with four other people owning it. The author uses great wording to tell us of the passion of Antonietta's maker and subsequent owners as they play this masterful piece of history.

[Amy]

This book was highly recommended to me by my mother. In going through our family library, in an effort to reduce the number of books we have at home, I decided to finally read it. I have made it as far as Act 2 and am putting it aside for now. It's a good enough book, but I'm itching for a different type of read at the moment. Will come back to this, I hope, someday.

[Margery · Rating 1 out of 5]

Not what I expected - found it didn't engross me - was I not in the mood or was it not as readable as other Hersey's books I've read.

[Carolyn · Rating 2 out of 5]

The movie was the best version of this book. Started out pretty good but then got off track, boring and hard to follow. I never finished the book, I decided it wasn't worth it.

[Minda · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book contains the magic three for a great book: great writing, knowable characters, and something unexpected. One of the greats!

[Helene · Rating 5 out of 5]

wonderful book. creative way to tie together multiple stories

[Katy Lovejoy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Too tired to read thus Today

[Steve]

Decided to wait until I get the digital version - I'm in love with my Kindle!