The Silver Screen

The Seasons

by Maureen Howard

Maureen Howard has long enchanted her readers with an urgent history of our extraordinary life and times. In The Silver Screen she conjures up the last days of silent movies in the story of Isabel Maher, who renounces the glamour of Hollywood and her talent. As Bel Murphy, wife and mother, she is confined to the drama of domestic life and plays it like a star.

Bel’s children struggle against the lives she has scripted for them: Joe, a Jesuit priest, is unsuccessful as a healer of souls; spinster Rita runs off with the love of her life, a gangster who turns state’s evidence; and there’s Gemma, an angry ambitious girl, who enters the Murphys’ magic circle. All three are pilgrims struggling to discard the myths of the past for the comforts and sorrows of the present. Joe’s journey takes him to the war of the gospel in El Salvador; Rita’s to the witness protection program; Gemma’s to problematic fame as a postmodern photographer. The flickering seductions and distortions of private lives play out against the novel’s rich historical awareness.

Darkly comic and truly moving, this is a brilliant exploration of the claims of the past and a passionate bid for freedom. Howard gives us the enduring pleasure of astounding writing and the superb craft of a consummate storyteller.

Genres: Fiction

256 pages, Hardcover

First published August 3, 2004

About the author

Maureen Howard is the author of seven novels, including Grace Abounding, Expensive Habits, and Natural History, all of which were nominated for the PEN/Faulkner Award. 'Facts of Life' is an award-winning autobiography. She is a 1952 Smith College alumnae and has taught at a number of American universities, including Columbia, Princeton, Amherst, and Yale, and was recently awarded the Academy Award in Literature by the American Academy of Arts and Letters. She lives in New York City.

Reviews

[James Murphy · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Silent Screen is the 3d volume of Maureen Howard's tetralogy about the seasons. Though essentially a family saga that spans 80+ years, its action occurs during the summer months and runs from the early green of lush June through the heat and festival of holidays and dog days to the time when the light turns more golden and its slants suggest autumn. The progression is from death to death, as if from the death of spring to the death of summer. The Silent Screen concerns the life of Isabel Maher, a promising star of early movies become Bel Murphy, Her children Rita and Joe have grown old with her, as has Gemma Riccardi, who has become like a daughter to Isabel. As the important fourth, she brings a square's symmetry to the form while bringing emotional disharmony to the character dynamic. In some ways it's a novel of opposites: life and death, Rhode Island and California, speech and silence, color and the lack of it. Its link to the 2 previous novels is the character of Fiona O'Connor, who's the mother of a character appearing in them. She becomes a kind of key unlocking the novel's final door. There we final all the novel's elements have moved through arcs of geography and time to tumble together in the final pages. It's beautifully done.

I can't understand why Maureen Howard isn't more widely known and read than she is. Her novels are rich with character and allusion and history, both personal and public. Her language is complex but poetic as it takes these characters along journeys necessary to come to terms with the past. Howard never disappoints.

[Bob Mantel · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not one of her best.

[Bookmarks Magazine]

Silver Screen is Howard's eighth historical novel. Throughout her career, critics have lauded her engaging stream of consciousness style, and Silver Screen is no exception. Most critics are pleased with the tale of Bel Murphy, an actress who opts out of her own career and directs the lives of those around her with varying degrees of success. However, some reviewers found Howard's interweaving timeline disengaging and would have preferred a more direct storyline. Others viewed her seasonal construct unnecessary, and her characters unconvincing. Buck up. After summer, there's always autumn.

This is an excerpt from a review published in Bookmarks magazine.

[Krista · Rating 1 out of 5]

I wasn't able to finish this book even after 85 pages. I normally make myself finish books even if I'm not enjoying them. It was a struggle to get through one page at a time.