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Mit der Zeit wird es dunkler: Roman
Kurz vor Ausbruch des Ersten Weltkriegs scheint in der Kleinstadt Draperville die Welt noch in Ordnung zu sein. Doch mit der Ankunft der Potters aus Mississippi, die den Anwalt Austin King und seine Frau Martha besuchen, wird das beschauliche Leben der Bewohner gestört: Die junge Nora Potter verliebt sich hoffnungslos in Austin, Vater Potter verleitet Austins Freunde zu waghalsigen Spekulationen... Diese vergangene Welt mit Pferdedroschken und überholten Wertvorstellungen existiert zwar so heute nicht mehr, doch die Welt der Gefühle hat die Zeit überdauert und wird von William Maxwell meisterhaft beschrieben.
415 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1948
80 people are currently reading
2003 people want to read
About the author
William Maxwell
118 books369 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads database.
William Keepers Maxwell Jr. was an American novelist, and fiction editor at the New Yorker. He studied at the University of Illinois and Harvard University. Maxwell wrote six highly acclaimed novels, a number of short stories and essays, children's stories, and a memoir, Ancestors (1972). His award-winning fiction, which is increasingly seen as some of the most important of the 20th Century, has recurring themes of childhood, family, loss and lives changed quietly and irreparably. Much of his work is autobiographical, particularly concerning the loss of his mother when he was 10 years old growing up in the rural Midwest of America and the house where he lived at the time, which he referred to as the "Wunderkammer" or "Chamber of Wonders". He wrote of his loss "It happened too suddenly, with no warning, and we none of us could believe it or bear it... the beautiful, imaginative, protected world of my childhood swept away." Since his death in 2000 several works of biography have appeared, including A William Maxwell Portrait: Memories and Appreciations (W. W. Norton & Co., 2004), My Mentor: A Young Man's Friendship with William Maxwell by Alec Wilkinson (Houghton-Mifflin, 2002), and William Maxwell: A Literary Life by Barbara Burkhardt (University of Illinois Press, 2005). In 2008 the Library of America published the first of two collections of William Maxwell, Early Novels and Stories, Christopher Carduff editor. His collected edition of William Maxwell's fiction, published to mark the writer's centenary, was completed by a second volume, Later Novels and Stories in the fall of 2008.'
William Keepers Maxwell Jr. was an American novelist, and fiction editor at the New Yorker. He studied at the University of Illinois and Harvard University. Maxwell wrote six highly acclaimed novels, a number of short stories and essays, children's stories, and a memoir, Ancestors (1972). His award-winning fiction, which is increasingly seen as some of the most important of the 20th Century, has recurring themes of childhood, family, loss and lives changed quietly and irreparably. Much of his work is autobiographical, particularly concerning the loss of his mother when he was 10 years old growing up in the rural Midwest of America and the house where he lived at the time, which he referred to as the "Wunderkammer" or "Chamber of Wonders". He wrote of his loss "It happened too suddenly, with no warning, and we none of us could believe it or bear it... the beautiful, imaginative, protected world of my childhood swept away." Since his death in 2000 several works of biography have appeared, including A William Maxwell Portrait: Memories and Appreciations (W. W. Norton & Co., 2004), My Mentor: A Young Man's Friendship with William Maxwell by Alec Wilkinson (Houghton-Mifflin, 2002), and William Maxwell: A Literary Life by Barbara Burkhardt (University of Illinois Press, 2005). In 2008 the Library of America published the first of two collections of William Maxwell, Early Novels and Stories, Christopher Carduff editor. His collected edition of William Maxwell's fiction, published to mark the writer's centenary, was completed by a second volume, Later Novels and Stories in the fall of 2008.'
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April 25, 2024
4 and 1/2 stars
William Maxwell's works contain the elements in fiction that I love: interiority; lovely, empathetic prose; and quotable passages that illuminate the universal. He understands human nature, from 4-year-old Abbey to the elderly, forgetful Mr. Ellis; from the quietly ambitious spinster sisters to the people-pleasing, slightly insecure, main character. Maxwell seems to understand us all, from the petty resentments we feel when our good deeds are misunderstood to those tenuous, fleeting moments when we feel truly connected to another.
Not until near the end does anything much seem to happen (which was fine with me, I loved the beginning and middle too), but that's deceptive, and perhaps a typical misunderstanding of life in a small town, because within its people resides a wide range of emotions that lead to quiet, though not necessarily benign, actions, and sometimes non-actions.
In the last few pages a loose end was too tightly tied up for my taste, while I thought a stray ribbon on that same bow might've been lengthened, but that's a quibble, as I'm still in love.
I think I've read enough of Maxwell now to add him to my short list of favorite writers, which means I want to read him all. I'm on my way ...
William Maxwell's works contain the elements in fiction that I love: interiority; lovely, empathetic prose; and quotable passages that illuminate the universal. He understands human nature, from 4-year-old Abbey to the elderly, forgetful Mr. Ellis; from the quietly ambitious spinster sisters to the people-pleasing, slightly insecure, main character. Maxwell seems to understand us all, from the petty resentments we feel when our good deeds are misunderstood to those tenuous, fleeting moments when we feel truly connected to another.
Not until near the end does anything much seem to happen (which was fine with me, I loved the beginning and middle too), but that's deceptive, and perhaps a typical misunderstanding of life in a small town, because within its people resides a wide range of emotions that lead to quiet, though not necessarily benign, actions, and sometimes non-actions.
In the last few pages a loose end was too tightly tied up for my taste, while I thought a stray ribbon on that same bow might've been lengthened, but that's a quibble, as I'm still in love.
I think I've read enough of Maxwell now to add him to my short list of favorite writers, which means I want to read him all. I'm on my way ...
June 22, 2025
What I feel most often when reading a William Maxwell novel is that someone has drawn the curtains back at my neighbor’s house, allowing me to look in without any chance of being detected, because he writes about the small things in a relationship that generally happen behind closed blinds. Time Will Darken It is no exception, for when we meet Martha and Austen King they are in their bedroom having one of those domestic spats that most married people can recognize immediately. Martha is pouting and refusing to go downstairs because Austen has invited the Potters, friends of his dead father, and their two children to spend an indefinite portion of the summer at the King home. Austen feels a bit trapped into the situation, and Martha feels blind-sided. It is just a forewarning of how wrong this entire visit is destined to be.
Austen is a bit clueless as to what Martha needs, although I would hardly fault him entirely, since her behavior is most often very childish and immature.
If he had held her a moment longer he would have given her all the reassurance she needed for some time to come, but he remembered the people downstairs, and let go. It was not his failure entirely. Women are never ready to let go of love at the point where men are satisfied and able to turn to something else. It is a fault of timing that affects the whole human race. There is no telling how much harm it has caused.
The Potters have brought with them their daughter, Nora. She is bored and just at that age to wish to be swept away by a slightly older man, and Austen becomes the object of her infatuation. Her bumbling parents present another problem in her life, as she deals with her failures to understand them and her desires to be independent of them.
There is nothing so difficult to arrive at as the nature and personality of one’s parents. Death, about which so much mystery is made, is perhaps no mystery at all. But the history of one’s parents has to be pieced together from fragments, their motives and character guessed at, and the truth about them remains deeply buried, like a boulder that projects one small surface above the level of smooth lawn, and when you come to dig around it, proves to be too large ever to move, though each year’s frost forces it up a little higher.
The Potters are not only a difficulty for Nora and her brother, they bring more trouble to Austen than just an inconvenient visit. Martha's life and her relationship with Austen are impacted, as well. As in any good tragic play, there is a transition for these characters that sees none of them in the autumn as they were when the summer began.
I did not develop any appreciable affection for any of the characters, but I did find them all realistic. Austen’s handling of Nora’s ridiculous profession of love is a study in what not to do, despite his intentions being well-meant. The story revolves around him, and he is far too trusting and almost completely lacking in any innate sense of skepticism or vision. He accepts responsibility in the wrong situations and fails to assume it in the parts of his life that literally demand it.
Maxwell, himself, never appears to be blaming or excusing anyone. He seems, rather, to be putting the story in vivid detail before us and saying, “This is life. It is what goes on behind the curtain. Most people neither know nor seek the truth of it, some do not wish to look behind the curtain at all, but you need not be evil to inflict pain upon one another.” It is this revelatory nature of Maxwell’s writing that lends it its timelessness. Nothing is simple in Maxwell's world. Man is complex--in the midst of a peaceful life he can create chaos, or in the middle of a storm he can find peace, but all too often, that peace cannot be trusted.
The storm had released all the accumulated tension of the long hot day. He didn’t mind being marooned in the barn or the fact that the house was full of visitors. Something inside him, he did not know what, had broken loose, had swung free, leaving him utterly calm and at peace with the world.
Austen is a bit clueless as to what Martha needs, although I would hardly fault him entirely, since her behavior is most often very childish and immature.
If he had held her a moment longer he would have given her all the reassurance she needed for some time to come, but he remembered the people downstairs, and let go. It was not his failure entirely. Women are never ready to let go of love at the point where men are satisfied and able to turn to something else. It is a fault of timing that affects the whole human race. There is no telling how much harm it has caused.
The Potters have brought with them their daughter, Nora. She is bored and just at that age to wish to be swept away by a slightly older man, and Austen becomes the object of her infatuation. Her bumbling parents present another problem in her life, as she deals with her failures to understand them and her desires to be independent of them.
There is nothing so difficult to arrive at as the nature and personality of one’s parents. Death, about which so much mystery is made, is perhaps no mystery at all. But the history of one’s parents has to be pieced together from fragments, their motives and character guessed at, and the truth about them remains deeply buried, like a boulder that projects one small surface above the level of smooth lawn, and when you come to dig around it, proves to be too large ever to move, though each year’s frost forces it up a little higher.
The Potters are not only a difficulty for Nora and her brother, they bring more trouble to Austen than just an inconvenient visit. Martha's life and her relationship with Austen are impacted, as well. As in any good tragic play, there is a transition for these characters that sees none of them in the autumn as they were when the summer began.
I did not develop any appreciable affection for any of the characters, but I did find them all realistic. Austen’s handling of Nora’s ridiculous profession of love is a study in what not to do, despite his intentions being well-meant. The story revolves around him, and he is far too trusting and almost completely lacking in any innate sense of skepticism or vision. He accepts responsibility in the wrong situations and fails to assume it in the parts of his life that literally demand it.
Maxwell, himself, never appears to be blaming or excusing anyone. He seems, rather, to be putting the story in vivid detail before us and saying, “This is life. It is what goes on behind the curtain. Most people neither know nor seek the truth of it, some do not wish to look behind the curtain at all, but you need not be evil to inflict pain upon one another.” It is this revelatory nature of Maxwell’s writing that lends it its timelessness. Nothing is simple in Maxwell's world. Man is complex--in the midst of a peaceful life he can create chaos, or in the middle of a storm he can find peace, but all too often, that peace cannot be trusted.
The storm had released all the accumulated tension of the long hot day. He didn’t mind being marooned in the barn or the fact that the house was full of visitors. Something inside him, he did not know what, had broken loose, had swung free, leaving him utterly calm and at peace with the world.
October 15, 2021
Wow…don’t read this book if you are down in the dumps. Unless of course the old adage holds true that misery loves company.
It’s been a while since I read William Maxwell…I guess perhaps I shouldn’t be surprised in that I do not think he is known for lighthearted fare. He is one of my favorite authors.
For the most part, this was extremely well-written. Why shouldn’t it be, given it was written by the fiction editor of the New Yorker (he held that position from 1936-1975)?
At first I thought the pace was a bit slow…and what was he getting at… But maybe he wanted some time to introduce the players of this story. Because at some point I became mesmerized. I started this last night and was done by early in the afternoon today. One of those novels where I had to know how it ended.
The story takes place in 1912 in a fictional town in Illinois, Draperville…I think it might he central to southern Illinois. Main characters are Austin King, a partner in a law firm, his wife who has just learned she is expecting their 2nd child, Martha King, and a (distant) cousin of his, Nora Potter, visiting from Mississippi along with the rest of her family.
Remind me not to live in a small town where everybody knows your name. Or at least remind me not to live in Draperville. People are two-faced…will be nice to you in public and then viciously gossip behind your back if it suits them. These folks took schadenfreude to new heights. But that’s only one piece of the story.
This was 302 pages with small print. Normally I whine with that length of a book because 1) I like to whine and 2) often I find the book to be too long. But I dunno…because Maxwell is such a good writer, that did not enter into the equation when it came to critiquing the book. My only critique is that it made me feel uncomfortable (like uh-oh, I was waiting for the next shoe to drop. And how bad was it going to be?). And so that’s not really a critique, is it?
I do not know how easy it is to get one’s hands on this book. On Abebooks there were only 13 copies of it…. the original hardcover from 1948 that were pricey, several copies in which the book was part of a collection of novels by Maxwell (pricey), and only 3 copies of a softcover edition. Maybe eventually this will be re-issued by perhaps the New York Review of Books? It ought to be re-issued.
Note:
• My copy was an ex-library edition of the original issue by Harper and Brothers in 1948. I got it around 20 years ago. It came from the Williams Free Library in Beaver Dam, Wisconsin. The library was built in 1891, the monies obtained from a wealthy philanthropist – it was the first public library in the United States to have open stacks. It’s really a nice-looking library (see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William... ).
• I didn’t know William Maxwell had a master’s degree from Harvard University and that he briefly taught at his undergraduate alma mater, University of Illinois. Huh!
• When JD Salinger was looking for a trusted first reader for the manuscript of A Catcher in the Rye, he chose Maxwell (I learned this from The Guardian, see the first review).
Reviews (when I read these reviews, I am heartened that others liked it/loved it, but wonder why in the hell this book is out of print???):
• This blogger liked the book too…” This is probably one of the best books I’ve ever read; beautiful, maddening and thought provoking, I know I’ll go back to it again and again. If you’ve never tried any William Maxwell, you really are missing out.” https://bookssnob.wordpress.com/2013/...
• https://www.theguardian.com/books/201...
• very good review but gives a bit too much away regarding the story line so save for later if you are going to try and get this book: https://www.theguardian.com/books/201...
• http://nik-writealot.blogspot.com/201...
• https://www.csmonitor.com/1983/1202/1...
It’s been a while since I read William Maxwell…I guess perhaps I shouldn’t be surprised in that I do not think he is known for lighthearted fare. He is one of my favorite authors.
For the most part, this was extremely well-written. Why shouldn’t it be, given it was written by the fiction editor of the New Yorker (he held that position from 1936-1975)?
At first I thought the pace was a bit slow…and what was he getting at… But maybe he wanted some time to introduce the players of this story. Because at some point I became mesmerized. I started this last night and was done by early in the afternoon today. One of those novels where I had to know how it ended.
The story takes place in 1912 in a fictional town in Illinois, Draperville…I think it might he central to southern Illinois. Main characters are Austin King, a partner in a law firm, his wife who has just learned she is expecting their 2nd child, Martha King, and a (distant) cousin of his, Nora Potter, visiting from Mississippi along with the rest of her family.
Remind me not to live in a small town where everybody knows your name. Or at least remind me not to live in Draperville. People are two-faced…will be nice to you in public and then viciously gossip behind your back if it suits them. These folks took schadenfreude to new heights. But that’s only one piece of the story.
This was 302 pages with small print. Normally I whine with that length of a book because 1) I like to whine and 2) often I find the book to be too long. But I dunno…because Maxwell is such a good writer, that did not enter into the equation when it came to critiquing the book. My only critique is that it made me feel uncomfortable (like uh-oh, I was waiting for the next shoe to drop. And how bad was it going to be?). And so that’s not really a critique, is it?
I do not know how easy it is to get one’s hands on this book. On Abebooks there were only 13 copies of it…. the original hardcover from 1948 that were pricey, several copies in which the book was part of a collection of novels by Maxwell (pricey), and only 3 copies of a softcover edition. Maybe eventually this will be re-issued by perhaps the New York Review of Books? It ought to be re-issued.
Note:
• My copy was an ex-library edition of the original issue by Harper and Brothers in 1948. I got it around 20 years ago. It came from the Williams Free Library in Beaver Dam, Wisconsin. The library was built in 1891, the monies obtained from a wealthy philanthropist – it was the first public library in the United States to have open stacks. It’s really a nice-looking library (see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William... ).
• I didn’t know William Maxwell had a master’s degree from Harvard University and that he briefly taught at his undergraduate alma mater, University of Illinois. Huh!
• When JD Salinger was looking for a trusted first reader for the manuscript of A Catcher in the Rye, he chose Maxwell (I learned this from The Guardian, see the first review).
Reviews (when I read these reviews, I am heartened that others liked it/loved it, but wonder why in the hell this book is out of print???):
• This blogger liked the book too…” This is probably one of the best books I’ve ever read; beautiful, maddening and thought provoking, I know I’ll go back to it again and again. If you’ve never tried any William Maxwell, you really are missing out.” https://bookssnob.wordpress.com/2013/...
• https://www.theguardian.com/books/201...
• very good review but gives a bit too much away regarding the story line so save for later if you are going to try and get this book: https://www.theguardian.com/books/201...
• http://nik-writealot.blogspot.com/201...
• https://www.csmonitor.com/1983/1202/1...
December 2, 2009
I love "Time Will Darken It." I am, to borrow a word from the book's back cover, besotted with it. It likes me; it is not entirely sure that love exists, but it is warm toward me, from a distance — the world is a harsh place but it projects more indifference than malice.
William Maxwell was one of America's clearest, sparest, most graceful writers, and "Time Will Darken It" is his masterpiece. Reading Maxwell is like sitting on a porch with a cold glass of water in your hand and all day to drink it. This novel is intimate and wise while exposing peoples' sadness and distance, their inability to connect, and the harm gossip can do.
Maxwell pokes at life from various angles rather than following slavishly a linear plot, but for the curious this novel is set in motion by the summer 1912 visit to small-town Illinois by a Mississippi family — foster relations, not blood kin, of lawyer Austin King. King and his family (wife, Martha; young daughter) take in these people they don't really know, the Potters, including the idealistic Nora, who falls in love with Austin. Austin's determination to be a nice guy, to be kind to Nora, to not make an issue of a situation obvious even to his wife, sparks a series of events that threathen his standing in a small community where appearance is reality.
Maxwell also subtly reveals characters in the Kings' orbit: their cook, their neighbors, the other Potters, people in Austin's law office. And there are short, mindful "comments" from things that do not have minds: a sundial, the heat, locusts, curtains, rain. (Trust me, it works.)
There pop up here and there paragraphs so lovely in their wisdom and simplicity you'll be stopped cold:
"The beautiful blind passion of running away is permitted only to children, convicts, and slaves. ... But if any free person tries to run away he will discover sooner or later that he has been running all the while in a circle and that this circle is taking him inexorably back to the person or place he ran away from. The free person who runs away is no better off than a fish with a hook in his mouth, given plenty of line so that he can tire himself out and be reeled in calmly and easily by his own destiny."
"Time Will Darken It" hooked me immediately, and I'm still lovingly worrying the wound in my mouth. I made no attempt to flee.
William Maxwell was one of America's clearest, sparest, most graceful writers, and "Time Will Darken It" is his masterpiece. Reading Maxwell is like sitting on a porch with a cold glass of water in your hand and all day to drink it. This novel is intimate and wise while exposing peoples' sadness and distance, their inability to connect, and the harm gossip can do.
Maxwell pokes at life from various angles rather than following slavishly a linear plot, but for the curious this novel is set in motion by the summer 1912 visit to small-town Illinois by a Mississippi family — foster relations, not blood kin, of lawyer Austin King. King and his family (wife, Martha; young daughter) take in these people they don't really know, the Potters, including the idealistic Nora, who falls in love with Austin. Austin's determination to be a nice guy, to be kind to Nora, to not make an issue of a situation obvious even to his wife, sparks a series of events that threathen his standing in a small community where appearance is reality.
Maxwell also subtly reveals characters in the Kings' orbit: their cook, their neighbors, the other Potters, people in Austin's law office. And there are short, mindful "comments" from things that do not have minds: a sundial, the heat, locusts, curtains, rain. (Trust me, it works.)
There pop up here and there paragraphs so lovely in their wisdom and simplicity you'll be stopped cold:
"The beautiful blind passion of running away is permitted only to children, convicts, and slaves. ... But if any free person tries to run away he will discover sooner or later that he has been running all the while in a circle and that this circle is taking him inexorably back to the person or place he ran away from. The free person who runs away is no better off than a fish with a hook in his mouth, given plenty of line so that he can tire himself out and be reeled in calmly and easily by his own destiny."
"Time Will Darken It" hooked me immediately, and I'm still lovingly worrying the wound in my mouth. I made no attempt to flee.
April 7, 2024
I love Maxwell, but this one was a bit of a departure from his other books. It's really the story of a brief few months in the small town of Draperville, Illinois, seen through the eyes of Austin and Martha King and their guests for the summer, relations of a sort, from Mississippi. In 1912, visits over long distances required longer stays. When it takes a day and a half by train to make the trip, people tend to stay for a while.
When I say the visit was a disaster, I'm understating. Little things that seemed innocuous at first took on different meanings through the eyes of the town. Austin failed to understand that their teenage daughter Nora, was infatuated with him, Nora failed to understand that him being nice to her was politeness, not returned love, and his pregnant wife Martha saw both sides clearly. I spent half the book wanting to slap both Austin and Nora for being so naive.
We also see the neighbors opinions of half-truths, and through the eyes of Abbey King, their 4 year old daughter, and Rachel, the black housekeeper who lives on the other side of the tracks. Same town, but not really, if you know what I mean. Maxwell gives us all this very realistically, without taking sides, in his matter of fact way and perfect sentences.
"The world ( including Draperville) is not a nice place, and the innocent and young have to take their chances. They cannot be watched over, twenty-four hours a day."
"It is a common delusion of gentle people that the world is also gentle, considerate, and fair. Cruelty and suspicion find them eternally unprepared."
Which is Maxwell's way of letting us know that even people who mean well with the best intentions can do irreparable harm. None of us know what others are thinking or their perception of innocent seeming gestures.
As always, a plot that goes deeper than it seems on the surface. I have one novel left to read from Maxwell, "The Chateau" and a few short stories. There are a couple more collections of his letters I'm looking forward to as well. Whether it's fiction or correspondence, he is a joy to read.
When I say the visit was a disaster, I'm understating. Little things that seemed innocuous at first took on different meanings through the eyes of the town. Austin failed to understand that their teenage daughter Nora, was infatuated with him, Nora failed to understand that him being nice to her was politeness, not returned love, and his pregnant wife Martha saw both sides clearly. I spent half the book wanting to slap both Austin and Nora for being so naive.
We also see the neighbors opinions of half-truths, and through the eyes of Abbey King, their 4 year old daughter, and Rachel, the black housekeeper who lives on the other side of the tracks. Same town, but not really, if you know what I mean. Maxwell gives us all this very realistically, without taking sides, in his matter of fact way and perfect sentences.
"The world ( including Draperville) is not a nice place, and the innocent and young have to take their chances. They cannot be watched over, twenty-four hours a day."
"It is a common delusion of gentle people that the world is also gentle, considerate, and fair. Cruelty and suspicion find them eternally unprepared."
Which is Maxwell's way of letting us know that even people who mean well with the best intentions can do irreparable harm. None of us know what others are thinking or their perception of innocent seeming gestures.
As always, a plot that goes deeper than it seems on the surface. I have one novel left to read from Maxwell, "The Chateau" and a few short stories. There are a couple more collections of his letters I'm looking forward to as well. Whether it's fiction or correspondence, he is a joy to read.
Want to read
November 20, 2017I have this in a volume with two other of Maxwell's works, The Chateau and So Long, See You Tomorrow.
I fish it out of its hiding place tonight, and find a bookmark at the start of the former of those, that is, after Time Will Darken It. So that says I've read it, and I vaguely remember doing so, but can't remember when, probably sometime in the late '90s of the last millennium.
So many unread books I have - and it seems that some I have read are masquerading as unread in the corners of my mind.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Previous review: Lonesome Dove
Random review: Nine Stories Salinger
Next review: Sense of an Ending
Previous library review: The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter
Next library review: Anthem ah well
I fish it out of its hiding place tonight, and find a bookmark at the start of the former of those, that is, after Time Will Darken It. So that says I've read it, and I vaguely remember doing so, but can't remember when, probably sometime in the late '90s of the last millennium.
So many unread books I have - and it seems that some I have read are masquerading as unread in the corners of my mind.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Previous review: Lonesome Dove
Random review: Nine Stories Salinger
Next review: Sense of an Ending
Previous library review: The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter
Next library review: Anthem ah well
September 4, 2011
I come away from every William Maxwell book more stunned that hasn't become part of the American cannon. His writing is flawless. This is a book all about unrequited love, and, as is always the case, he deals with the subject honestly and sensitively. I can't say a single bad thing about this book it's wonderful. I'll never stopped being amazed by his ability to define and contextualize life's experiences and the people we share them with.
November 11, 2013
Maxwell is the gentlest of writers. No filler here--spare but yet so descriptive. Each sentence being so precise and controlled that you don't even realize where he's quietly taking you until you've suddenly arrived.
July 30, 2021
I loved this when I first read it in my 20's, somewhat less so now, but still a great picture of a quieter time in America. I decided to reread it as a counterpoint to Ray Bradbury's Dandelion Wine, which was an oversweetened look back at 1920's small town midwestern America. What I liked about Maxwell's book (which was written 20 years later and covered a similar kind of town in 1912), was its re-creation of life in this protected, seemingly idyllic setting, and then the slow revealing of the cracks in the edifice both to the reader and to the main character, who is the epitome of financial and reputational privilege, doesn't know it and has to confront the fates when what he didn't earn is unfairly taken from him.
The writing has its lovely bits, although there are quite a few rough edges and the generalising remarks were often clumsy. But I appreciated the way Maxwell tried to preserve his memories of a way of life, people and place, fondly but without romanticising it. In this respect I found it far superior to Bradbury's book.
The writing has its lovely bits, although there are quite a few rough edges and the generalising remarks were often clumsy. But I appreciated the way Maxwell tried to preserve his memories of a way of life, people and place, fondly but without romanticising it. In this respect I found it far superior to Bradbury's book.
August 16, 2011
Imagine, if you will, a narrative centered on Michael Bluth, only plunged backwards a century and with all wit and comedy replaced with tragedy and... tragedy. What remains is the story of a bourgeois pillar of the community whose total inability to disappoint anyone or to shrug off expectations leads to disaster after disaster. This is a very slow-moving slow burner of a slow character study that slowly grinds toward its depressingly understated climax, but what a tragic climax it is. Ooof.
Also, surprisingly progressive regarding race and gender for its time, although the most interesting storyline in that regard didn't really go anywhere which is, I think, what kept this book from being really and truly great.
May 7, 2008
Maxwell's Time Will Darken It is among the most rewarding and satisfying reading experiences I have ever had. His characters are wonderfully made. With sparse style and grace he captures the quiet spaces of day-to-day living, the in-between areas in which lives unfold. The novel is also among the best depictions of the interiors of marriage I have encountered, with the intricacies of the interatctions between Nora and Austin, awaiting their second child and besieged by the visitation of distant relatives, rendered simply and movingly. A fine, fine novel.
February 23, 2008
Amazing writing. Compassion. Heart.
We need more of this in contemporary fiction. More compassion. What an amazing writer. His insight, detail and careful prose grabbed me. His empathy and grace would not let me go.
I could not put this down.
We need more of this in contemporary fiction. More compassion. What an amazing writer. His insight, detail and careful prose grabbed me. His empathy and grace would not let me go.
I could not put this down.
October 20, 2013
Such a sensitively written book! Why have I never discovered Maxwell before?! Some readers may be annoyed that most of the action of the novel happens "offstage" and that Maxwell is more concerned with exploring the inner lives of his characters than writing a plot that flows A to B to C, but if you can get over the fact that this is not a novel as you expect it to be, you can relax and let yourself glide along in the hands of a master. My entire book is underlined with quotes I loved. What the great Impressionists did with painting, Maxwell does with words. And....it has one of the best endings I've ever read!!!!!
June 13, 2012
A fantastic book! Maxwell's power lies in his ability to transition between the specific and the general, moving from the domestic minutia of a family in early 20th century Draperville, Illinois to thrilling abstractions that link these intimacies to general truths on a much larger scale. Totally impressed by this book and excited to read more of what Maxwell has to offer.
March 27, 2017
Maxwell's ability to limn incisive character portraits may be second to none. I felt I got to know these 1912 characters and their small town very well, and they often felt quite contemporary despite having been created in 1948. In the end, I guess I was expecting more of a payoff story-wise. Maxwell may be a little too subtle for me, but he's a pleasure to read nonetheless.
July 31, 2014
I agree with other reviews that Maxwell's power of description and observation is something to behold. I also very much enjoyed reading a story set in Illinois in 1912 and felt transported to another time. However, my main grumble personally is that nothing very major happened throughout (with the exception of the end, but even this was unsatisfactory personally). Minor characters (like Rachel) were introduced but never fully explored and this left left me wondering why they had been given the stage in the first place (if someone can please illuminate me, I would be so grateful). Also, a lot of the action happens in hindsight with the author alluding to but never fully explaining. For this, the tempo lagged for me a third of the way through the book and never quite found it's rhythm again. I still enjoyed however due to the beautiful thought provoking prose.
May 3, 2015
This is a wonderful book by a great author who has not received the recognition he deserves. Although perhaps best known for the award winning So Long, See You Tomorrow, Maxwell's masterpiece may be this novel about the effect a visiting set of relatives has on a family, their friends and neighbors. Maxwell is a master at creating characters, both male and female. He also has a deft hand in placing these characters in a certain time and place. I felt I could walk through the door of the King house on Elm Street in 1912 to enjoy the buffet supper and be a first hand observer of how the Southern relatives begin to charm the natives of Draperville, a small city in the midwwest. Highly recommend.
June 15, 2020
To me, great writing is defined by sentences like this, in which such an economy of words is able to say so much.
After three unbroken blocks, Elm Street dipped downhill in a way that was dangerous to children trying out new bicycles.
From these 20 words, we know that this is a small, affluent town, and that Elm Street is a tight-knit community. The neighborhood is not dangerous in the sense of gun violence and drug abuse. Instead, the greatest threat here is a skinned knee.
However, if you think this is a sweet story about Norman Rockwell's neighborhood, you are mistaken. Feminism, racism, and even incest are all treated equally here - impressive for a story published in 1948.
After three unbroken blocks, Elm Street dipped downhill in a way that was dangerous to children trying out new bicycles.
From these 20 words, we know that this is a small, affluent town, and that Elm Street is a tight-knit community. The neighborhood is not dangerous in the sense of gun violence and drug abuse. Instead, the greatest threat here is a skinned knee.
However, if you think this is a sweet story about Norman Rockwell's neighborhood, you are mistaken. Feminism, racism, and even incest are all treated equally here - impressive for a story published in 1948.
February 18, 2013
A wonderful read that I could not put down. His characters are never truly one thing or another. Like many of us in the world they have shades of good, bad, petulance, tolerance, and pasts that shape them. And like real life, we never truly know where it is going.
Why did it take a bookseller to tell me about this novel? Why isn't Maxwell ranked up there with other great American writers of the 20th century?
Why did it take a bookseller to tell me about this novel? Why isn't Maxwell ranked up there with other great American writers of the 20th century?
February 17, 2020
I love William Maxwell's writing but I didn't connect with this story or the characters in the same way as I have with his other books. This one was missing something for me.
Ratings:
Writing 5
Story line 3
Characters 3
Emotional impact 3
Overall rating 3.5
Ratings:
Writing 5
Story line 3
Characters 3
Emotional impact 3
Overall rating 3.5
July 5, 2012
William Maxwell needs a better publicist. He can really paint a place and its people with words. Movingly to boot.
June 19, 2017
Maxwell can do no wrong in my eyes. I was absolutely swept away by this gorgeously written novel, and found it incredibly rich, both psychologically and emotionally. Remarkably taut and unexpected.
June 21, 2017
This is a beautifully (and masterfully) rendered tale of a year or so in the life of a married couple, Austin and Martha King, who live in a mid-sized north midwest town in the early part of the twentieth century. On the surface their life seems to be ordinary and happy. They have a small daughter, and Austin makes a good living as junior partner in a law firm. They serve as hosts to relations from the south who stay for a few weeks. But there's a lot going on beneath these calm waters. Austin finds himself attracted to Nora, a distant cousin, who falls in love with him. He finds himself questioning his marriage, which has never been one of wild passions or deep proclamations of love. Both he and his wife ask themselves (and, more obliquely, each other) whether there should be more to their lives, and consider other possibilities. Maxwell makes you feel deeply for both; the story becomes one of poignant and uncertain redemption.
December 27, 2011
I just had one of those moments when you pick up a book by chance, written by an author you've never heard of, and the results are quietly astonishing. Maxwell's powers of description are transporting, and the characters he creates indelible. This is a quiet book, set in turn-of-the-last century Illinois, about a small-town lawyer living in his father's shadow, who invites his shirt-tail southern relatives to stay with him and his newly-pregnant wife, one summer before the war to end all wars. Complications ensue, in what is to me a melding of Cormac McCarthy's flowing power of describing both interior and exterior states with Stella Gibbons' incisive and darkly comic view of human nature. Your mileage may vary...
May 8, 2012
There's something about this author - he just sets a mood, time, and place that I am immediately drawn into. My quibble with this book was there just were too many major scenes that took place "offstage". The author would set up a scene and then leave it to the reader's imagination, or he would commence a new scene and refer to something that happened, but which he doesn't fully explain. I can go along with a certain amount of that, but there were one or two times I really wanted to be there when this dramatic stuff happened. I wanted him to write the moment.
I have one more book of his on my list to read.
I have one more book of his on my list to read.
May 10, 2023
Geez, what a downer. A riveting, family-centered story set in 1912 and no one’s happy. Pretty early on life in this rural Illinois town slides into the shits and only heads downhill from there. It also seems that the author is a bit of a misogynist, as most of the female characters come off as irritating and/or extremely troubled. The book was published in 1948, when mental illness was unheard of and racial and sexual discrimination was rampant, as it appears in the novel. At least Martha, one of the main characters, seems to take charge of her life and destiny…maybe. The writing is good, but I found the final line of each of the short chapters extremely predictable and sermonizing.
September 1, 2015
An overlooked classic, period.
To borrow from Eudora Welty's review of the book: "Maxwell's sensitive prose is the good and careful tool of an artist who is always doing exactly what he means to do. The careful, meditative examination of unfolding relationships among people of several sorts and ages - all interesting - has Mr. Maxwell's expected integrity, and the story's quiet and accumulating power a dark and disturbing beauty that has some of its roots, at least, in fine restraint."
If you enjoyed Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates then you're sure to enjoy Time Will Darken It.
To borrow from Eudora Welty's review of the book: "Maxwell's sensitive prose is the good and careful tool of an artist who is always doing exactly what he means to do. The careful, meditative examination of unfolding relationships among people of several sorts and ages - all interesting - has Mr. Maxwell's expected integrity, and the story's quiet and accumulating power a dark and disturbing beauty that has some of its roots, at least, in fine restraint."
If you enjoyed Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates then you're sure to enjoy Time Will Darken It.
July 30, 2019
The first book I ever read of Maxwell's, not necessarily the one I'd recommend starting with though. A beautiful, truthful and delicately written book, although possibly less immediate than some of his others such as 'So Long, see you tomorrow'. I went on from this to read everything else he's ever written and he never disappoints.
*Please note: this review is my personal opinion only. Please ask permission from me first before using it, or any part of it, for marketing or reviewing purposes, whether online or in print. Thank you.
*Please note: this review is my personal opinion only. Please ask permission from me first before using it, or any part of it, for marketing or reviewing purposes, whether online or in print. Thank you.
August 21, 2009
I think the only people who will appreciate this book are writers, or character study enthusiasts. I am neither and was completely bored the entire book. Maybe this is a representation of the inner workings of traditional family life? Who knows....all I know is that I wouldn't recommend this book to anyone I know. Not to say the author isn't talented...simply I don't appreciate this kind of story telling.
January 9, 2014
A very moving book that will stay with me for a long time.
Set in a time when Women and Men had their own roles and knew how to behave.
Class and cultural divide.
How a marriage suffered by the Southern relatives who stay one summer never to be the same again.
''Women are never ready to let go of love at the point where men are satisfied and able to turn to something else.It is the fault of timing.''
A new author to me and I'll certainly be reading more.
Set in a time when Women and Men had their own roles and knew how to behave.
Class and cultural divide.
How a marriage suffered by the Southern relatives who stay one summer never to be the same again.
''Women are never ready to let go of love at the point where men are satisfied and able to turn to something else.It is the fault of timing.''
A new author to me and I'll certainly be reading more.
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