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Tatiana's Reviews > My Brilliant Friend
My Brilliant Friend (My Brilliant Friend, #1)
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I just don't get the hype. I found the writing (or translation) incredibly choppy and the story overlong, repetitive and incoherent at times.
There must be better writers in Italy than Ferrante.
There must be better writers in Italy than Ferrante.
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My Brilliant Friend.
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Reading Progress
October 6, 2014
– Shelved
October 6, 2014
– Shelved as:
to-read
Started Reading
January 26, 2015
– Shelved as:
abandoned
January 26, 2015
– Shelved as:
2015
January 26, 2015
– Shelved as:
foreign-lands
January 26, 2015
– Shelved as:
why-the-hype
January 26, 2015
–
Finished Reading
September 27, 2019
– Shelved as:
dnf
Comments Showing 1-8 of 8 (8 new)
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Helen
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rated it 1 star
Mar 06, 2016 01:04AM
I agree entirely, but am struggling on because a friend bought it for me. Not only that - she's my best friend and she bought me the whole trilogy! Please advise - what can I say to my friend when she asks me if I liked it?!
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It seemed to me that the translator failed, or the editor did. In too many places, the syntax or the punctuation were wrong or inadequate to the intended meaning.
I agree with Tatiana: what is all the hype about? Either something was lost in translation or the editor should have been sacked. The book should have been half the length, it was repetitive and incoherent and often the translation appeared inadequate in terms of intention. If this is the best writer Italy can offer, it is woeful.
Hear, hear! Glad to see I'm not the only one who found this book an utter disappointment!
Umberto Eco. One of the best in the world (if you still want to read Italian writers). Dario Fo, Dino Buzzati. Probably anyone who is not Elena Ferrante :) I totally agree witth you review.
I agree, same thought.
I'd recommend Donna Leon. A rare American-born European with decades of Mediterranean living and elegant compassionate insight into Venetian life and Italy's particular social geography.
So glad to find your review and feel less alone in my opinion! I'm 60% through and all I can think is that Atwood's "Cat's Eye" is better!
