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Pears, Iain The Portrait ISBN 13: 9781594481758

The Portrait - Softcover

 
9781594481758: The Portrait
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A national bestseller from acclaimed author Iain Pears, The Portrait is a novel of suspense and a tour de force.

An art critic journeys to a remote island off Brittany to sit for a portrait painted by an old friend, a gifted but tormented artist living in self-imposed exile. The painter recalls their years of friendship, the gift of the critic's patronage, and his callous betrayals. As he struggles to capture the character of the man, as well as his image, on canvas, it becomes clear that there is much more than a portrait at stake...

Iain Pears's An Instance of the Fingerpost and The Dream of Scipio are also available from Riverhead Books.

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Review:
Iain Pears deals in a very sophisticated form of dark narrative; his elegantly written novels (of which The Portrait is a very persuasive example) now have a keen following. This book has the same impeccable storytelling and quietly malignant tone as the one that made his reputation, An Instance of the Fingerpost. The new novel’s punning strapline, ‘vengeance is an art’, refers to the art theme that is Pears’ métier. In his books, civilised people perform very uncivilised actions, with the world of art a microcosm for the darker reaches of the human soul.

Set on the bleak and windy island of Houat near the coast of Brittany, The Portrait describes the retreat into isolation of the painter Henry MacAlpine, who has performed a Gauguin-like cutting off of his previous life, leaving a successful career in London (not to mention rich patrons and enthusiastic gallery owners) behind him for a more spartan existence in this unvisited spot. Several years pass, and the reclusive MacAlpine is called upon by the first person he has seen from his old life in four years. This is the art critic William Nasmyth, whose approbation (or otherwise) can make or destroy an artist's career. He has come, he says, to sit for a portrait. What follows is a remarkable battle of wills between two very driven individuals; a psychological duel that has echoes of the mordant writing in the early plays of Harold Pinter. The other analogy that springs to mind for Pears’ compelling and disturbing novel is the Ingmar Bergman film Persona, similarly set on a remote island, which also treats of a personality shift between two strong-willed individuals. During the course of the sitting, the real subject of the novel becomes clear through the conversation of the two men: this is a scarifying narrative of thwarted desire, cruelty, suicide and even murder. This spare and economical novel exerts a grip from the first paragraph, and its two main protagonists are drawn with assiduously observed detail. --Barry Forshaw

Review:
"Mighty scary. Only an author as clever and confident as Pears could pull off this trick."--Newsweek

"A stripped-down exercise in creeping dread."--Christian Science Monitor

"A shrewd and masterful raconteur...a tour de force."--The Washington Post Book World

"Weirdly haunting, the traps [Pears] sets for the critic are also traps for the reader."--Baltimore Sun

"One gutsy novelist... The suspense becomes almost unbearable."--Boston Globe

"A fascinating world of high-minded literature written on a small canvas."--Houston Chronicle

"An exquisite little gem."--Booklist, starred review

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  • PublisherPenguin Publishing Group
  • Publication date2006
  • ISBN 10 159448175X
  • ISBN 13 9781594481758
  • BindingPaperback
  • Number of pages224
  • Rating

Other Popular Editions of the Same Title

9780007232819: THE PORTRAIT

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ISBN 10:  ISBN 13:  9780007232819
Publisher: William Collins, 2006
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9780676977516: The Portrait

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9780786278756: The Portrait (Thorndike Press Large Print Basic Series)

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