depthsofglory

Depths of Glory: A Biographical Novel of Camille Pissarro | Irving Stone

We made it to the end, but was it the ending you expected? Was Pissarro‘s ultimate success worth what it took to get there? (For him and his family!) And how did you feel about Stone ending where he did? I liked the cyclical elegance of beginning and ending with the Expositions, but since Stone chose to end before Pissarro‘s death, I was not convinced that Pissarro‘s fortune stayed good. There had been so many ups and downs before! Thoughts?

Deblovestoread, smilingshelves

Lcsmcat #depthsofglory 5y

Lcsmcat As for a “review”, I‘m glad I finally read it (Sorry Aunt Gina!) But I won‘t rush out to buy more books by Stone. It seemed better written at the end than the earlier chapters, which could lend credence to my theory that he wrote it using leftover notes from his Van Gogh book, or could be that it took me that long to get into it. 🤷🏻‍♀️ 5y

smilingshelves I was kind of surprised that he ended there instead of with Pissarro's death. I thought the same thing you did - how do we know that things stayed good? This certainly wasn't my favorite by him. I loved The Agony and the Ecstasy and liked The Greek Treasure. But I'm glad I read this one to see all the connections between those Impressionist artists that I didn't know about. But it wasn't as compelling a read as I expected. 5y

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Lcsmcat @smilingshelves What‘s The Greek Treasure about? And is it this long? I know not all of his are chunksters. 5y

smilingshelves @Lcsmcat It was about Henry Schliemann's discovery of Troy. I knew nothing about the topic, so I found it fascinating. It's pretty long, but I don't think it's as long as Depths of Glory. 5y

Lcsmcat @smilingshelves Interesting. I looked it up on Litsy and no one has commented on it, and there was no description. 🤷🏻‍♀️ 5y

smilingshelves It's been a while since I've read it, but if I remember right, there was more action and less redundancy. 😊 5y

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Lcsmcat

Depths of Glory: A Biographical Novel of Camille Pissarro | Irving Stone

Book convergence: two very different books, Depths of Glory (top) and The Professor‘s House (bottom) both mentioning the Dreyfus Affair! #catherbuddyread #depthsofglory

Graywacke Neat, but also really sad. 😐 5y

Lcsmcat @Graywacke The Stone Book makes a point of his innocence and the anti semitism involved. 5y

Graywacke @Lcsmcat I think Cather was more interested in her character‘s take than the factual record. It was interesting, since I usually only see it from a much greater distance. 5y

Lcsmcat @Graywacke Agreed. She was serving the story with a historic tidbit. 5y

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Lcsmcat

Swann's Way | Marcel Proust

My#FebTBR continues three for #depthsofglory #shakespearereadalong and #catherbuddyread plus one for #readwithmrbook, starting #Proust2020, and whatever #Books pin is chosen from the pictured shelf. It‘s a good thing it‘s a leap year - I‘m going to need that extra day. #februaryfeels @Eggs

Eggs 🥳📚💗👏🏻 5y

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Lcsmcat

Depths of Glory: A Biographical Novel of Camille Pissarro | Irving Stone

Pissarro‘s detour/descent into Pointillism: Was he brave or foolish to defy everyone who had been an ally? Did this experiment improve his later painting or just slow him down? And how do you feel about his desires for his oldest son‘s life compared with Julie‘s? #depthsofglory @Kdgordon88 @smilingshelves

smilingshelves I'm Team Julie all the way as far as their kids are concerned! It's fine to teach and encourage them to be artists, but not to make them think that's all they can be. Art is important. But being practical and having food to eat are important, too. I guess his sons didn't suffer too much from growing up poor if they wanted to follow the same path as Camille. 5y

smilingshelves And the pointillism detour was interesting. He was never stagnant, never satisfied with his art. He was always looking for a way to improve, to experiment, to try something new. That's a good thing for an artist, no matter the medium. It's curious that so many of his fellow artists were upset with him about it. @Kdgordon88 5y

Lcsmcat @smilingshelves I felt the same way about the reaction of his friends. They were acting just as stubborn as the Academy! 5y

Lcsmcat I wonder about the connection between Pointillism and the techniques used to make digital pictures, but that‘s a rabbit hole for another day. 😀 5y

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Lcsmcat

Depths of Glory: A Biographical Novel of Camille Pissarro | Irving Stone

Pissarro‘s work is maturing, but his life is still a roller coaster of instability! Did the Impressionists help or hurt themselves by mounting their own shows? Was Eugene Murer their best friend, or did he exploit them? (Pictured are Murer‘s portrait and Murer at His Pastry Oven.) And how are you feeling about Stone‘s writing/treatment of the subject matter? #depthsofglory #readalongs2020 @Kdgordon88 @smilingshelves

smilingshelves I found the crowd's reactions to their shows just crazy. Riots? Just because of a new art style? It's not like the paintings were profane or anything. Why were the ridicule and anger necessary? @Kdgordon88 5y

Lcsmcat @smilingshelves Me too, but then I thought of how some people reacted to abstract art in a more recent era. Not riots, but certainly contempt. And the Soviets under Stalin killed artists of all types for the “wrong kind” of art. 5y

smilingshelves That's true. There were riots at the premiere of Stravinsky's Rite of Spring. Art is polarizing in all eras, I guess. Goes to show how important it is to us as humans. And so important on the individual level that Pissarro would live in poverty nearly his entire adult life just so he could continue painting. 5y

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Lcsmcat @smilingshelves Yes. Even in concentration camps where all one‘s energy went into survival, people made art. It does seem to be necessary to human life. The Stravinsky riots, however, had a slightly different cause. There was inadequate time for rehearsal and (it‘s a difficult piece with lots of meter changes) the orchestra wasn‘t together. So the dancers couldn‘t lock in to the music and it was basically a mess. 5y

smilingshelves Although even when the Stravinsky piece is together, it still sounds like basically a mess. 😄 5y

smilingshelves As far as Stone's writing style is concerned, I find it interestingly distant. Some events that he covers in a paragraph could have been made into an entire book by a different author. I know he has to cover a long timespan in 600 pages, but sometimes I don't understand why he spends pages on some important events and sentences on others. 5y

Lcsmcat @smilingshelves Can‘t agree about Stravinsky (I wrote my senior music history paper on him and as an oboist love to play him) but totally agree on theStone front! It almost seems like he had research left over from a book on some other artist and was looking for a way to use it. 5y

smilingshelves Brahms and Beethoven are my favorites, but I can see why you would enjoy playing Stravinsky. 😊 I wondered about that, too. Did he ever write a book on Monet? He seems to include a lot of details about his life. Or maybe he started researching Monet and decided focusing on Pissarro would be a better way to cover the Impressionists? 5y

arubabookwoman I just read Zola‘s The Masterpiece, his fictionalized account of the late 19th century Parisian art scene, so I‘m stacking this. Although none of Zola‘s characters closely track real artists, I‘ve seen comments that his main character may be based on Cezanne. 5y

Lcsmcat @arubabookwoman Zola is mentioned a lot in this as a friend of the Impressionists and a schoolmate or childhood friend of Cézanne. 5y

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Lcsmcat

Depths of Glory: A Biographical Novel of Camille Pissarro | Irving Stone

A lot happened, or didn‘t, in these chapters. His father pushing him to get into the Salon, he didn‘t. Julie following him all over (do you thinkStone is right, that she didn‘t mind playing 2nd fiddle to his painting?) being disinherited. And always the name-dropping of other celebrities of the day. And how could anyone tell anything about a painting in a situation like the above Salon? #depthsofglory #readalongs2020 @Kdgordon88 @smilingshelves

Lcsmcat Also,this is #basedonatruestory #auldlangreads @Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks @OriginalCyn620 5y

smilingshelves I know they complained when their pictures were hung by the ceiling, but I didn't realize the ceiling was so tall. No wonder they complained! I felt so bad for Julie in this section. I think she minds a lot more than she lets on. On the other hand, her life could have been a lot worse if he didn't treat her as his wife and had abandoned her. So maybe she's grateful to have what she does. 5y

smilingshelves But to move all the time and always be a stranger, having to start over in a new neighborhood would be very hard. @Kdgordon88 5y

OriginalCyn620 👍🏻📚 5y

Lcsmcat @smilingshelves Yes! And in areas where you‘re an outsider unless your grandfather was born there. It must have been so difficult! 5y

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Lcsmcat

Depths of Glory: A Biographical Novel of Camille Pissarro | Irving Stone

About the painter Daubigny “There was no mistaking his expression: try not to be any more stupid than is necessary.” (Portrait of Daubigny by Nader) #depthsofglory

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Lcsmcat

Depths of Glory: A Biographical Novel of Camille Pissarro | Irving Stone

Julie Velay, 1860. How are you finding the beginning of our boy‘s career? I wondered why Stone started where he did- I would have liked more about the time in Venezuela, as that seems to have been a big influence on Pissarro. But I‘m learning lots about the man and about art in general. So (pun intended) what are your impressions? @Kdgordon88 @smilingshelves #depthsofglory #readalongs2020

smilingshelves I agree that more about his early life would have been interesting. I understand that Stone wants to focus on his life in France because there we get the overlap with all the other painters (which is interesting, too. I didn't know Pissarro and Monet were such friends!). But pacing-wise, I feel like we could have expanded the early years and shortened the current ones. 5y

smilingshelves Thanks for posting this painting. I kept meaning to look it up, but never did. She's so completely covered by her clothes! I'm not a painter, so I guess I don't understand why he felt the need to sketch everything under the clothes in detail. And really, how did he get away with coming up to her room at night for so long?? 5y

Lcsmcat @smilingshelves I too wonder how undetected those visits were. The smell of paint and turpentine alone would give them away! But maybe they weren‘t as undiscovered as they thought they were? 5y

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Lcsmcat @smilingshelves I am not an artist, but I can see the need to sketch the body under the clothes, but coloring it in? That, I think, was for his own reasons. 5y

smilingshelves Right! You can't even see a, ahem, certain area in the way she is sitting. Ulterior motive, I think! The smell of paint is a good point. Even if his family (beyond his sister) didn't notice, surely the cook in the room next door would have. 5y

Deblovestoread I agree with you both. Having the earlier years fleshed out would have added something especially since he couldn‘t leave the palm trees behind. That time mattered to him. I am not convinced they wouldn‘t have been found out between the smells and the conversation. I love looking up the paintings as we go and enjoy Stone‘s writing. @smilingshelves 5y

Lcsmcat @Kdgordon88 @smilingshelves I‘m hoping the dialogue gets less stilted as we go on. Sometimes it feels to me like Stone found Pissarro‘s philosophy of art somewhere and tried to force it into little speeches to Julie. 5y

smilingshelves I was also wondering what his sources were. It sounds like he's quoting journals or letters or something. Accurate, yes. Natural-sounding, not so much. 😊 @Kdgordon88 5y

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Lcsmcat

Depths of Glory: A Biographical Novel of Camille Pissarro | Irving Stone

If anyone else in the #depthsofglory buddy read has been looking up the paintings mentioned, I found a great resource here for Pissarro‘s work.
https://www.camille-pissarro.org/Portrait-Of-Julie-Velay-Wife-Of-The-Artist-C.18.... I‘m still using Google for other artists. @Kdgordon88 @smilingshelves

smilingshelves What a beautiful painting! I've looked up some of his artist friends, but not so many of his own paintings yet. 5y

Deblovestoread Thank you for this! I am not as far as I should be due to looking up the paintings and a few life hiccups but I will persevere. 😀 5y

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LitsyHappenings

Depths of Glory: A Biographical Novel of Camille Pissarro | Irving Stone

Repost for @Lcsmcat :

My original schedule was too ambitious - I find myself stopping to google each piece of art mentioned! So here‘s a revised schedule for #DepthsOfGlory. #readalongs2020

Lcsmcat Thanks for the repost! 5y

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