Blue Hour

by Lilian Pizzichini

Jean Rhys was an artist of brilliance and fury. But she was also a woman in constant psychological turmoil, whose blazing talent rescued her time and time again from the abyss. This title follows Rhys from her girlhood in Dominica, through three failed marriages and five misunderstood books, up to her death in 1979.

Genres: Biography, Nonfiction, Biography Memoir, Memoir, Womens, Literature, Writing

336 pages, Paperback

First published April 26, 2009

Reviews

[James Barker · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's not always possible to feel you would like Jean Rhys as a person when you read the highly autobiographical content of her extraordinary, slender novels. There is a callousness to her, an element of self pity, a morose side to her personality. I read this biography to see if her life justifies the negativity that seemed to cloak her.

The problem is it's not the best written biography… Pizzichini refers so often to Rhys' own (unfinished) account of her life, 'Smile Please,' that half way through I started to think I should have perhaps just read that instead. I am not sure making the book you are writing obsolete is such a good idea. There is also a lifelessness to the work that matches the lows of Rhys' life but not enough to reflect the odd highs. Worst of all Pizzichini can't help but reach too far in fictionalising elements of the story, imagining what Rhys was thinking. None the less, it was at times an illuminating read, evidencing how easy it was for respectable women to fall in the early twentieth century. It also illustrates how Jean always felt, as a white Caribbean, an outsider. While growing up in Dominica she felt the native islanders distrusted her and her family's former slave-keeping ways (she also felt she did not belong in her family, which is traumatising in itself); after emigrating to England her accent was scorned as ridiculous and strange. She was out of step every where she went.

It's easy to be sensationalist about Rhys. She had a brief career as a prostitute, hung out with the likes of Hemingway in Paris, had an affair with Ford Madox Ford (along with a number of other married men), had a history of abandoning her children, was something of an alcoholic, a husband-beater with regard to at least one of her three husbands, was in constant trouble later in life with the police for violence and disturbing the peace and even ended up in jail for a time. But Pizzichini hits the nail on the head when she says that Rhys should simply have written more for it was the peace that writing gave her that calmed the inner roil that constantly threatened to make her go under. And Rhys was a phenomenal writer, producing work that is somehow ethereal despite being seeped in desperation. My advice would be to pick up any of her novels over this biography. You will see Jean Rhys in them, warts and all, and while you might not always like the turns she makes you will appreciate the powerlessness of her position as a woman of slender means in the twentieth century. That's the synopsis of her story.

[Karen Witzler · Rating 5 out of 5]

About 1979 - 1980 I read all of Jean Rhys. The Complete Novels: Voyage in the Dark / Quartet / After Leaving Mr Mackenzie / Good Morning, Midnight / Wide Sargasso Sea.

Much later I came across this biography written by Lilian Pizzichini. It is fantastic and is one of the best biographies of an author/artist/woman that I have ever read. It felt like an undiscovered Rhys novel and Pizzichini was well equipped to delve into the nuances of class, identity, a sort of prostitution, and full-blown alcoholism. Highly recommended if you are reading Jean Rhys.

[Elaine · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an exceptionally powerful biography. Having read most of Rhys's novels, I now have a clearer sense of how they connect to her life. Rhys did not set out to be a writer but appears to have been encouraged by Ford Madox Ford, whom she credits with being one of the most important influences in her life. And what a tormented life it was. It's almost as if Rhys was determined to remain unhappy. Of course, her alcoholism was a serious factor and one that was never fully addressed in her life. Still, she has left us some truly remarkable writings. Rhys was fearless in her honesty, not to mention an exceptionally talented writer, quite possibly a genius. Lillian Pizzichini provides a vivid and deeply moving portrait of this artist. I suspect that Pizzichini is also capable of producing remarkable fiction.

[C.S. Burrough · Rating 4 out of 5]

A thoughtful friend overseas bought and posted this book to me, unaware of my having read it twice – once after buying it before giving it away, the second on loan from my library. Without hesitation on rereading the life of my favourite author, I became immersed a third time.

Lilian Pizzichini draws much from Carole Angier's Jean Rhys: Life and Work (1990), producing a more condensed product. Her other main primary source is Rhys' Smile Please: An Unfinished Autobiography (1979).

This piece focuses on Jean the person, without the extensive theoretical commentary on her literary technique that so protracts Angier's earlier biography to its 792 printed pages. (The Blue Hour contains basic coverage of Rhys' writing but in a comparatively slender 336 printed pages.)

Indeed, Pizzichini's word economy and 'instinct for form' (among Rhys' own key trademarks) make this biography also a stylistic tribute to Rhys.

On all three readings I was struck by its leaning towards the commentariat's judgmental take on Rhys the dysfunctional woman. Though this seems inescapable, documenting such a broken character, Rhys' staunchest fans would applaud volubly if someone, someday, wrote more sympathetically, less condescendingly, showing a more strident alliance with this unique literary voice.

Admittedly, Pizzichini doesn't go as far in this respect as Carole Angier, who even concludes with a second-hand posthumous diagnosis of Borderline Personality Disorder. She touches, like Angier, on Rhys' positive character traits, while gesturally rationalising Rhys' dysfunctional side.

Yet I found myself leaping to Rhys' defense at each derisive inference. If still here to comment for herself, Jean would almost certainly call all of her biographers 'smug', 'respectable' and 'sneerers'.

Despite those personal issues I remained hooked by this biography. Where it triumphs over Angier's is in its pace and concision - for those seeking a faster, shorter read, that is. It makes no pretense of supplanting Angier's more fleshed-out 1990 study, still the undisputed definitive model for Rhys aficionados.

Like Rhys' prose, The Blue Hour is captivating, poignant and in parts exhilarating. Though an often patchy echo of Rhys and Angier combined, Pizzichini's work is slickly executed, sticking to factual historic elements, avoiding dry academic commentary and styled in the tradition of its subject: Jean Rhys. Hence my four stars.

Overall, nothing could give me greater pleasure than reading about this extraordinary woman, of whose life and works I have read far less engaging accounts than this.

Absolutely worth a read by any Rhys fan.

[Joan Colby · Rating 4 out of 5]

A combination of a difficult personality, dismal situations, disappointing relationships plus alcoholism resulted in Rhys sad lifestyle. Growing up in the West Indian isle of Dominica, she was disdained by her mother and felt like an outsider in her family. Sent to school in England, she also failed to fit in. She embarked on a career as a chorus girl which prompted her lifelong attraction to sugar daddies; older distinguished men who could support her, but never satisfied her need to be loved. Conversely, she was also attracted to con men and lowlifes, marrying a couple of the former, having a child that died shortly after birth and another that she placed with a nurse and saw only intermittently. Rhys attracted people who were moved to help her throughout her life, but these connections never lasted long, as it seems she thrived on conflict. Her masterpiece “Wide Sargasso Sea” was thirty years in the writing, set aside for long periods as Rhys descended into alcoholic mayhem and was even briefly jailed for assault. Her earlier novels were based on her life and the various men she loved and lost. Her life raises the question as to whether her histrionic personality contributed to her talent or whether she would have produced more and greater work had she more self-control. Pizzachini’s biography has a novelistic bent which works well to evoke the problematic character of Rhys.

[Laurie Notaro · Rating 3 out of 5]

So torn about this book. While the story was fascinating and a page-turner, I absolutely had nothing but disdain for Jean Rhys. I have known too many people like her who destroy other people's lives to feel any sympathy for her whatsoever. And that was unsettling--reading this book also made me feel a little insane because my reaction was so strong to Rhys. I detested her. Her writing seems to be her only redeeming quality, because she was horrid. Her life was difficult because she made it that way; she abused every single person in it. The book however, made me want to read more of her writing, being that she struggled over every word of it.

[Bettie · Rating 2 out of 5]

Bettie's Books

[Jean · Rating 2 out of 5]

This literary biography left me wanting to reread Rhys’ “After Leaving Mr. McKenzie” while being steadily annoyed by the author’s many far reaching presumptions of how and why Rhys thought and felt. For example, this sentence asserting why Rhys did not write any books for an extended period after a minor court appearance: “The sneer behind the smile; the thought that everyone was laughing at her – Max and his phantom (or were they?) women, the lofty, disdainful neighbours, the stern police, the mocking reporters in the court – her own bewilderment and humiliation destabilized her to such an extent that she could not write for years.” There is also florid overwriting, such as when mentioning Rhys’ hotel room near a Paris train station: “She was so close to the station she could smell the lovers leaving.”

[Tara · Rating 3 out of 5]

Carole Angier's earlier biography seemed definitive to many. This is a much shorter book, more of an interpretative biography and an introduction to Jean Rhys. Whereas Angier often seemed judgemental - and with such a destructive, fragmented subject, it's hard not to be - Pizzichini seeks to understand Jean's thoughts and feelings. At times she is insightful but there are a lot of suppositions. But it's still an interesting read, because Rhys was a brilliant writer and lived her life on the edge of madness and disrepute. Nobody can tell Jean's story as well as she did in her own novels and short stories, and perhaps this is why she continues to defy explanation.

[Katy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jean Rhys' volatility and private battle with madness seems to have been overshadowed by her famous depiction of 'the madwoman in the attic' who took on Rhys' tortured emotional existence and allowed its author to hide behind the white hot trail she blazed. Jean Rhys lived what can only be described as an exhausting life. Her success seems to have barely touched her; her stories and novels wrenched out of a deeply broken place inside of her that was ruled by alcohol and internal violence that seemed to last her entire, long, lifetime.

[Nina-Marie Gardner · Rating 4 out of 5]

Meh. A great book as a 'soft' introduction to the genius that was Jean Rhys- I would highly recommend to Jean Rhys naifs.

But die-hards and those who can handle a more harrowing read should go with Jean Rhys: Letters 1931-1966 for a truer & more comprehensive picture of her life & who she was. I mean, the Letters are in her own words, ya know? (I blogged in more detail about the Letters here: http://bit.ly/r5TwR3)

[Mind the Book · Rating 3 out of 5]

En littslatt jag inte ville ta med mig in i 2019. Rhys hade onekligen ett spännande liv, men finner mig bläddra otåligt förbi alkoholrelaterade nattliga vredesutbrott, crazy cat lady-åren, make nr 1, 2, 3...

Det enda jag vill veta är om tillkomsten av Wide Sargasso Sea. Minns hur jag fick frissons när en littprofessor på universitetet berättade om den och madwoman in the attic-begreppet. På sidan 276 finns en talande lista med nästan ett trettiotal alternativa titlar inför publiceringen, som till slut skedde i oktober 1966:
Solitaire
Before the Break of Day
Before I Was Set Free
Purple Against Red
Dream
Mrs Rochester
The Question and the Answer
All Souls
Three Voices
There Comes a a Time
Story of the First Mrs Rochester
That Wild Sea of Wrecks Where I Was Wrecked

[Kathleen Jones · Rating 3 out of 5]

Jean Rhys was a complex character who behaved appallingly throughout her life, but her friends forgave her because - when she was young - she was both beautiful and gifted, and - when she was old - she was vulnerable and gifted. She abandoned her baby daughter, beat up her husband, and assaulted her neighbours. She drank heavily, suffered from depression and had a total inability to look after herself, or do anything to help herself - what a friend described as 'fatal passivity'. Yet she wrote two of the iconic books of the 20th century - Voyage in the Dark and Wide Sargasso Sea (as well as three other novels, a memoir and 2 collections of short fiction).
The seeds of her mental health problems and heavy drinking lie in her childhood on Dominica as the daughter of a Welsh doctor and a Creole mother. Jean was rejected by her mother, tormented by a Dominican nanny and sexually abused by an elderly neighbour - traumas from which she never recovered. She claimed to be unable even to turn on the radio to find a programme she wanted to listen to. When she was young, it was the kind of helplessness that attracted men and she lived on handouts from them as a young woman - among others she was the mistress of Ford Madox Ford.
I expected this new biography - the first for quite a few years - to shed additional light on what I already knew about Jean Rhys, but the author confesses that it relies on Carole Angier's earlier (and much fuller) biography for much of its information. The author also makes too many assumptions for me - and the lack of footnotes makes it of less value for study.
But Lilian Pizzichini writes well and she's very good on Rhys' early life, but the last part of Rhys' life is skimmed over and there's nothing much on Rhys' marathon legal battle with the woman to whom she carelessly signed away her copyrights.
If you want a light read, this is fine as an introduction, but if you want to know what Jean Rhys was really like, Carole Angier's biography is still the one to beat.

[Judith · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had trouble getting into the book -- I think because I thought I needed to keep track of who all of the people were. Once I figured out that the trick was to just keep reading, I really got into it. What a fascinating, tragic, genius life she led. Pizzichini did a great job, when referring to a person, in identifying them... such as her cousin Lily, etc. I have ordered Wide Sargasso Sea, because I wan't to read Rhys works.

[Christina · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was ok, but definitely not great. I felt like most of the author's research came from reading the novels of Jean Rhys. While admittedly autobiographical, I don't think that they should be quoted (unattributedly) as descriptions of exactly what she was feeling or thinking at any time in her life. An interesting life, not very interestingly told.

[S. · Rating 3 out of 5]

"literary biography". telling that of 75 reviews, 30 people felt compelled to add a comment.

does it work? yes.

is it fantastic? well...

Pizzichini relives Jean Rhys' life through a semi-literary "reimagining," where she speculates on the internal life of Rhys rather than writes strict biography.

interesting concept; i'm glad it read it; does not become a "great" work

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gorgeously poetic portrayal of this writer's life; Rhys had the kind of tortured and tragic but darkly glamourous and eventful life that makes for serious personal unhappiness, but fabulous biography reading.

[Leiki Fae]

I didn't like this book, but it did provide a detailed chronology of Jean Rhys's life that I think is useful for fans of her work.

[Kirsty · Rating 3 out of 5]

I borrowed this a little early from the library in anticipation of a book club read during the summer. I must admit that I have been a little disappointed thus far with the books of Rhys' which I have read, but I was still interested to learn about the woman herself. There is certainly quite a lot of depth within The Blue Hour, which details where and how Rhys lived over the course of her life. She had a sad existence in many ways, with her first child dying in infancy, mental health problems, and spiralling into alcoholism. Despite the obvious strengths of such a biography in educating the reader about a focused subject, I just do not think that Pizzichini really captured the essence of Rhys. Yes, she described a lot of what happened to her, but Rhys still comes across as rather a shadowy, two-dimensional figure. The Blue Hour did not hold my interest quite as much as I had expected it would at the outset.

[Terry Pitts · Rating 3 out of 5]

As someone who greatly admires her novel Wide Sargasso Sea, I wanted to get a sense of Jean Rhys before reading some of her other novels. Pizzichini provides a readable, non-scholarly overview of her life and her writing, neither of which needs to be described in any detail here. Pizzichini's biography is apparently pretty lightweight in comparison with Carole Angier's earlier, more comprehensive life of Rhys. But I didn't mind this breezier and much shorter version, which will give any reader a clear sense of Rhys's difficult life and how it led to her books and stories. Nevertheless, it's still hard to comprehend how Rhys managed to write Wide Sargasso Sea in her seventies - at the end of a life of unbroken disappointment, in the midst of poverty, while caring for an ailing husband, and facing an unending set of challenges, most of which she brought upon herself.

[Jarvis K Kelahan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I haven't read any of Jean Rhys' novels and after reading this biography I am not keen on picking them up. It seems like she was insufferable, lacking respect for anyone or anything, taking advantage of benevolent people around her. I think I would be very repelled by Jean if I ever had a chance to meet her. In my opinion, her somewhat complicated and unhappy childhood cannot justify her often horrible behavior. While her work does focus on important issues like lower rungs of society, abortion, sexuality, and race, the biography states that it also, in large measure, voiced Jean's own fears, experiences, insecurities, desires and fantasies. I am not interested in reading about the latter.

An OK read, learned some new things from it but I was mostly upset and frustrated by the woman I was reading about.

[Sherry · Rating 3 out of 5]

For Read Harder Challenge #1, Read a biography of an author you admire. I admire Wide Sargasso Sea, but can't say I admire Jean Rhys after reading this biography. She comes across as a cruel, maybe insane, woman who had a traumatic life. This is more of an interpretive biography, with a lot of speculation throughout about what Rhys might have been thinking or feeling. I think I would like to read a more factual account someday, maybe Jean Rhys : Life and Work.

[Ghost of the Library · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wide Sargasso Sea remains to this wide one my all time favorite books, safely ensconced in the top 10 since reading it 20 years ago....but of its author I knew very little, well almost nothing actually.
Its not always a good idea to know the human behind your favorite book/character, it can disappoint you and at times shock you, however when it comes to Jean Rhys I have zero regrets in reading this!
Jane Eyre may be a literary masterpiece but contrary to most, I was first drawn to Bertha Mason as portrayed by Charlotte Bronte, and it wasn't until a few years later than I could appreciate Jane fully....so I understood and love with a passion Jean Rhys telling of the life of the madwoman in the attic.


To be continued......

[Agnes · Rating 2 out of 5]

By page 100, I wasn't sure if I liked the book
by page 200 I wasn't sure if I liked Jean Rhys.

Wide Sargasso Sea is a genius idea and I do want to read her short stories

but

I couldn't wait for this to be over. It was depressing she was so self destructive she did the same things over & over.
After a while I couldn't tell the people apart- the men in her life and friends were all the same.
Sometimes I felt sympathy and sometimes not.

I feel so bad for her daughter.

[Fran Henderson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Does Jean Rhys justice, and paints her as a multifaceted, intriguing and funny person. I regret somehow not visiting Cheriton Fitzpain, where Rhys spent her latter years, while I was studying, but I feel I got a grasp of where she lived through being in Devon. Really enjoyed maybe the only thing I would have liked more would be a stronger textual focus

[Shaun Rylands · Rating 3 out of 5]

Finished reading The Blue Hour by Lilian Pizzichini: a biography of Jean Rhys, one of my favourite writers. We have faith in the poison - we know how to offer up our life, day after day, entire.

[Lauren · Rating 5 out of 5]

beautiful beautiful story of her mysterious and sad life ,and yet she wrote her heartfelt stories ,with braveness even when leaning happily of men she found along the way- well done

[E.J. · Rating 3 out of 5]

I didn't realise just how awful Jean Rhys was! An entertaining read, although I don't think everything was entirely accurate - the phrase 'artistic license' comes to mind.

[Cooper Renner · Rating 4 out of 5]

Quite an interesting read, presumably mostly accurate, of the tragic life of a gifted writer.

[Lore Carrillo · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Blue Hour is beautifully written and completely engaging. I finished it in two days because I simply couldn't put it down. I kept reading and reading hoping at some point I would come to understand if not like or identify with Jean Rhys. It never happened. This woman is the picture of a plethora of mental illness. Rather than making her sympathetic, her demeanor and her abhorrent behavior made me absolutely detest her. Her childhood was rife with emotional and physical abuse, yes. But at some point your childhood and its tragedies stop being an explanation and start being an excuse. Her pathetic passivity and insistence on playing the victim were infuriating and maddening. I wished more than once that i could reach into the pages of the book and shake her by the shoulders until she grew a spine and a conscience. She used and abused everyone she came into contact with and despite her seemingly complete helplessness and pervasive mental instability, she still managed to die in relative comfort. I simply can't wrap my head around how she managed to survive for so long with so little effort at sustaining herself or why so many were so willing to support her for so long. It also seemed that not only was she perfectly willing to accept help and charity from everyone around her, but she felt entitled to it. Despite the repeated assertions of self loathing, I found her cunning and calculating and manipulative to an almost diabolical degree. Still, I was left wanting to read what I can find of her writing if only to determine whether there truly was some genius behind the madness.