The Far Side Of A Kiss - Softcover

Haverty, Anne

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0099281783 ISBN 13: 9780099281788

Publisher: Vintage, 2001

Synopsis

When William Hazlitt published Liber Amoris, his 'book of love', in 1823, scandal rocked the literary world. He had chosen as the object for his grand Romantic passion a mere serving maid - and she had disillusioned him by proving just as tawdry as all the rest. But what of Sarah Walker, the victim of Hazlitt's unfortunate obsession? In a magnificent work of imaginative empathy, Anne Haverty rescues her from silence and obscurity to let her tell her side of the story. 'He has put me in a book,' she says. 'He had but a frail steel nib for his weapon but he has destroyed me by it as clean as if he used a blade and impaled me on its point.' She describes her gradual seduction by the wild man of letters - day by day, hour by hour - as she tries to ward off inappropriate advances without offending him, but can't help being fascinated by his stories of revolutionary France and the pleasures of Italy.The Far Side of a Kiss is a gripping, heartbreaking novel of Romantic folly and below-stairs pragmatism. With an extraordinary lightness of touch and considerable wit, Haverty summons up London life in a nineteenth-century boarding house and the mutual incomprehension between the literary world and the working class. She creates in Sarah an unforgettable character full of silliness and wisdom, unhappiness and vivacity, naivety and intelligence. By the final chapter, readers can o

About this title

Review:

"Luminous intelligence, humour and sympathy. Early 19th-century London and the 19-year-old Sarah live and breathe." -"The Times""Anne Haverty's ability to imagine the sights, smells and voices of early 19th-century London is nothing short of miraculous... brilliantly done." -"Sunday Telegraph"

About the Author:

Anne Haverty was born in Tipperary and now lives in Dublin. Her highly acclaimed first novel, One Day as a Tiger, won the Rooney Prize and was short-listed for the 1997 Whitbread First Novel Award. Her first collection of poetry, The Beauty of the Moon, was Poetry Book Society Recommendation in 1999.

About this edition

• Publisher: Vintage
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 0099281783
• ISBN 13: 9780099281788
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 256