MOMENTS OF TRUTH

by Lorna Sage

Paperback. Pub Date :2002-09-02 272 English HarperCollins UK Accessible. jargon-free. and with her characteristic clear intelligence. Lorna Sage looks at the ways in which pre-war women writers. some famous. some less well known. invented themselves as authors in the face of the rigid conceptions of feminine creativity which prevailed at the time.Edith Wharton. Virginia Woolf. Katherine Mansfield. Jean Rhys. Christina Stead. Djuna Barnes. Violet Trefusis. Jane Bowles. Simone de Beauvoir. Christine Brooke-Rose. Iris Murdoch. Angela Carter.Moments of Truth demonstrates Lorna Sages characteristic clear intelligence and sheer versatility as a writer. bringing together introductions to much-loved 20th-century classics. fiercely intelligent essays and insightful. free- thinking journalism. A mixture of close reading with a breathtaking sensitivity to nu...

Genres: Nonfiction, Essays, Biography, Feminism, Womens, Writing, Criticism

Paperback

First published January 1, 2001

About the author

The eldest child of Valma and Eric Stockton, she was named after Lorna Doone [1]. Sage was born at Hanmer, Flintshire, Wales, and educated at the village school, then at the Girls' High School in Whitchurch, Shropshire. Her childhood in the late 1940s and early 1950s is recalled in her last book Bad Blood. Sage became pregnant when she was 16 but was able to continue her education and won a scholarship to read English at Durham University, only after the university changed its admission rules to allow married couples to study there. Sage went on to receive an MA from Birmingham University for a thesis on seventeenth century poetry.

All of her academic career was spent at the University of East Anglia, where she was Professor of English Literature from 1994. She edited The Cambridge Guide to Women's Writing in English (1999) which has become a standard work. In the Preface she wrote: "In concentrating on women's writing...you stress the extent and pace of change, for the scale of women's access to literary life has reflected and accelerated democratic, diasporic pressures in the modern world".

Reviews

[bobbygw bobbygw · Rating 5 out of 5]

Terrific. Sage, sadly no longer with us, was a phenomenally and thoroughly well-read essayist, journalist and critic of literature, not just of the 20th century, but from the 18th. She not only understood what the writers and their work were about, she knew about the culture and society within which they lived, engaged and often struggled.

This collection of some of her journalism - there's another fab, broader and larger selection titled Good As Her Word, also published by Fourth Estate - is focused on a range of brilliant women writers. They're not linked in any way, other than the writers are all female and great and the fact that these pieces all reflect Sage's tremendous insight, appreciation and sensitivity for the work of these writers, leaving you always with a deeper understanding of their psychology and renewed interest in their novels.

From an obituary of Irish Murdoch (both as a novelist and philosopher, and the relationship between these two), to intelligent essays on perhaps lesser known novelists Christine Brooke-Rose and Djuna Barnes (and certainly this applies to Violet Trefusis), to the well-known Edith Wharton, Angela Carter (I think she's the best critic on Carter's work - and has written a book entirely on her), Edith Wharton, Virginia Woolf, Katherine Mansfield, Jean Rhys, Christina Stead, Jane Bowles, and Simone de Beauvoir, you will finish this collection with a passion to read the novels Sage discusses. What better recommendation for a literary critic's work?

[Stef Rozitis · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was an interesting, if at times complex book. I had not read all the authors and their works mentioned in it (in fact almost none of them, and now I feel remiss in that). Reading about the authors and their possible agendas makes me want to go to all those works (or most of them) now and read them. I don't know if I will find in them the same things Sage does or not but it appears she has been friends with some of the authors so maybe knows some of the inside stories.

This book definitely won't be for everyone because it is quite nerdy in ton (for me that was fun) and it discusses whether an author (for example) has deconstructed something or deconstructed the act of deconstruction or failed to to either. I didn;t think unnecessarily long words were used but certainly the book delved deeply and complexly (ha ha neologism) into the texts and authors it analysed. There was a lot of reference also to other and older texts, sadly much of this went over my head. You'd have to be a literature scholar yourself to discuss these things with Sage on an equal footing, I had to take her word for some things.

There was a feminist perspective, but it was a wryly, almost tongue-in-cheek feminism not a flag waving in-your-face feminism so you don't have to be feminist yourself to appreciate these analyses. I am glad Sage put me onto so many female writers, some of which I was unaware of- when you study at school or university the reading lists are still overwhelmingly male, and from this it seems unnecessarily so.

Maybe it was stingy of me to only give this book four stars, I will consider that. Many books I read and immediately give away but I will hold on to this one a little longer and maybe dip into it again when I read some more of these authors (or reread people like Virginia Woolf).

Worth a look if you are a nerdy bookworm, especially one interested in feminist perspective.

[Brian Gowthorpe · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting collection of essays and book reviews about 12 C20 women writers. The upper reaches of literary theory, Barthes etc are rather beyond me and less interesting but the maverick, kick over the traces nature of these women pioneers and iconoclasts comes across loud and clear. Katherine Mansfield was one crazy mixed-up kid.

[Piper Mejia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Informative as if I attended a university course.

[Kirsty · Rating 4 out of 5]

Compelling and beautifully written anecdotes, and I feel I learnt a lot.