Welcome to Litsy!

Not gonna lie. I had to read some reviews & take time to think about this before I could write a review. It is still reverberating through my system. Deceptively simple & short but it carries so much weight - of personal power or lack thereof, of being given up at birth, of music (I found myself listening to the music that the main character refers to), of hidden memories. My first Levy and I‘ve already grabbed a second of hers from the library.

Elsa is a famous concert pianist who drifts around Europe after she, mid-performance, walked off stage.
In meeting her doppelgänger, she sees a signal to figure out who she really is.

As a child she was adopted by Arthur Goldstein, a genius piano teacher, when her talent became clear.
Now he is dying and she can‘t keep sheltering in the trance of performance.

As always, I love reading Deborah Levy‘s words and sentences.

Elsa is a gifted pianist who choked during a Rachmaninov concert. Disgraced, She‘s become a private piano teacher who sees her double regularly as she bounces about Europe. The writing is lovely - as Levy‘s always is. Recommended.

Deborah Levy‘s sentences are so beautiful that I didn‘t mind feeling rather lost for the first part of this brief, cryptic novel. A professional musician has a mental crisis that forces her to stop performing. She is avoiding something about her past but keeps circling around it. By the end, I was emotionally invested in this woman‘s journey towards self-knowledge. Audiobook read by Alix Dunmore.

We laughed for awhile. A strange laugh. The release of deep rage.

I‘m not sure I really got this, but I enjoyed reading it. The whole doppelgänger part just went right over my head. This was #7 in votes for #CampLitsy23, and I think our campers probably would‘ve helped me get it. Low pick.

Elsa, a piano virtuoso who was adopted at a young age by her instructor, broke down and left the stage. She travels through Europe trying to make sense of this breakdown until she is called to her instructor‘s deathbed.

I love how Levy can write sentences that can be read one way, or another - and how a lot of meaning can be packed into one. This was such a dreamy, atmospheric book with great characters and places. I would reread it 💙 #tbrtarot

Anyway, he continued, what I really missed in the lockdowns was buying a coffee. Sipping a flat white. If my identity is so fragile it depends on a flat white to keep it together, I can't see the point of those years I've spent reading difficult theory and philosophy. Capitalism sold a flat white to me as if it were a cup of freedom.

I love Levy‘s writing and storytelling style and this was no exception. Her dry humor and stripped down prose always resonate with me. And her stories and characters pack a punch. I loved this story of a woman coming to terms with her past and learning to define herself rather than live by the terms others set for her.

I love the intensity and interiority of Levy‘s writing and this is a story that very much sits in the interior world of its protagonist, a child prodigy struggling with imperfection, identity, and connection. For me, the occassional appearances of Elsa's double didn't feel as fully realised as her struggle with her talent and its limits, or the complexity of her familial identity. Nevertheless this was an immersive reading experience.

Beautiful sad story about love and belonging. About coming into one‘s own life and being true to oneself. Would read again. She says much in what she doesn‘t say as well

I am a fan, not objective about Debra Levy's writing. I was captivated by this short novel, read it in one sitting. I did not understand all of the plot, but it did not matter. I understood her main character and all the feelings. Beautiful. 5 🌟 ( I do hate the cover!)

Elsa is a concert pianist who falters in a rachmaninov solo ,rushing from the stage. In Greece, she sees a woman, her double who reappears in Paris, London, + Italy as Elsa deals with a complicated passt + the pending loss of her mentor. As with all of the author's brilliant writing, her use of imagery, colour, + dialogue is beautifully expressed, leaving you full but wanting more.
#booked2023 @Cinfhen @BarbaraTheBibliophage @alisiakae

^^the anticipation of the piano, stuck in a field

P6 “My piano teacher, Arthur Goldstein, had told me the piano was not the instrument, I was the instrument.”

Page 29 “I am a natural blue.”

P35 “I discovered I was brutal.”

P60 “ Isadora Duncan was ridiculous. She had to be, I replied, she was making something new.”

123 “Inflation would rise, sea levels would rise, everybody would be out of work and underwater.”

Impressionistic & dreamy interiority, beautiful settings in Poros, London, Paris, Sardinia. Identity, doppelgängers, stranger‘s voice, artistry, inspiration, the release after major failure & humiliation. Isadora Duncan. Stolen hats & horses. Post-lockdown freedom & anxiety. Reinvention. Female creativity & power. But Elsa‘s composition never develops before story‘s end… we must imagine her release, her daring. Uncentered but memorable. 2023

A professional pianist stop playing mid concert. This event is something she will look back on as she travels to Athens, Paris, London and Sardinia. She will work as a piano teacher to kids in some of these places thinking about her own childhood and her piano teacher who is more like a father.

A book about relationships and family and friends and finding yourself.

#DoubleSpin June @TheAromaofBooks
2nd book #JoysOfJune @Andrew65

“I first saw her in a flea market in Athens buying two mechanical dancing horses.”

#FirstLineFridays
@ShyBookOwl

so I asked Marcus how they relaxed.
I like to dance with Skippy to Prince.
I like to watch Isadora Duncan dance on YouTube
Who‘s she?
The mother of modern dance.
How modern?
She was born in 1877.

🤣🤣🤣 I guess everything is relative

(Picture of Isadora Duncan found online)

At one point we heard something smash.It‘s Skippy trashing the place, Marcus said. Are you sensitive to noise?
I told them how Mozart‘s ear was so delicate the sound of a trumpet too close made him faint. Marcus fell about laughing.

(Does anyone know if this is true?)
(Picture of Mozart found online)

I thought I was going to love this and I did. I didn‘t go into it trying to analyse it; I just enjoyed the atmosphere and the beautiful prose. However, I feel like re-reading it straight away to unpick it a bit more; it would have been so good as a #camplitsy23 choice @BarbaraBB @Megabooks (so near but not quite near enough!)

Pic is from the Cleveland Way in North Yorkshire - the blue sky could be the Med in August!