Man of Property : The Forsyte Saga

This is a surprisingly good read. While many of the characters are pompous and dull, the writer never is... and although it takes a long time for a truly sympathetic character to come on the scene, there is never any confusion as to the point of view being presented. The book takes an interesting look at the drive for ownership that infected English society then, as it infects all relatively prosperous societies then and now. The characters are clearly portrayed, laughable and lovable, or despicable, or merely human. The plight of Irene, a beautiful woman, desired but regarded as an asset by her husband, is one that fascinates and terrifies me as a female reader. Thank god we were not born in that time!

Everyone's heard of "The Forsyte Saga," the BBC family epic of the late Victorian Age. Fewer have read the Galsworthy book, and that's a shame, because it's fascinating on so many levels. "The Man of Property" is only the beginning of a fabulous story--you will want to find out what happens to these characters. On the surface it's the story of Soames Forsyte, the quintessential icon of the growth of the upper middle classes and the decline of the nobility during the Victorian era. Descended from a farmer in Dorset in the not-too-distant past, Soames is a lawyer and a man of property. He buys wisely, sells more wisely, and husbands his wealth and that of the family. He is in control of everything that affects him, except one thing--his wife. Desiring to possess the sensitive, beautiful, genteel but poor Irene, and with the help of a callous mother, Soames pressures Irene into becoming his wife. From this single mistake, the one time Soames let passion rule, his life and the lives of his family and their descendants are changed in unpredictable and frightening ways. Galsworthy's theme is the constant tussle in life between property and art, love and possession, freedom and convention. In the fine tradition of family sagas, these themes play themselves out over and over with each generation. On another level, this is the story of an age, the story of the British Empire at its peak. Galsworthy packs his book with allusions to the great crises of the time, the Boer War and WWI, the rise of Labour, the death of the Queen, the spread of "democracy." The Forsyte homes are meticulously detailed, from the French reproduction furniture to the dusty sofas to the heavy drapes, to the fireplace grate, to the electric lights in the old chandeliers. Soames collects art, and Galsworthy showers us with the opinions of a British gentleman of the great and not so great art of the day. The saga was written over a period of many years, and on yet another level I found the the changes in Galsworthy's style from the rather clipped, detailed recitations of events and commentary typical of the 19th century to the more expressive style of the 20th. Especially in the first volume of the three, family relationships are painstakingly laid out, the rounds of dinners and family gatherings carefully chronicled. By the third volume, To Let, Galsworthy reveals the love of the countryside and the pain of repressed emotions that the family members a generation ago would have hidden. The writing is very beautiful--as in this sentence: "Fleur raised her eyelids--the restless glint of those clear whites remained on Holly's vision as might the flutter of a caged bird's wings." It took me a good six weeks to plow through The Forsyte Saga, but it was worth it.

This book is bound to appeal to readers like myself who are interested in novels of manners, but should also be an interesting read for the more general reader The Forsyte clan will be recognizable to virtually everybody as members of the splendid and self-satisfied middle class and in a sense the story is about what happens when other people notable for something besides their position (beauty or talent) come into contact with them. One of the things that I like about Galsworthy is that while he spares nothing in his treatment of the Forsytes, he is also not unfair or unkind. The good aspects of the Forsytes (June and Jolyon) are treated as well as the bad and in the end I even felt as sorry for Soames (almost) as much as I did for Irene or Bosinney. The Man of Property is bound together with a short interlude called "Indian Summer of a Forsyte" which takes you through generational change and into (presumably) the next novel. I look forward to reading the entire saga.

This is the first volume in the 9 volume sweeping family saga, and it sets the high watermark. In many ways I think it is the best, most especially the final chapter, when one era segues into the next, as generational change occurs.It is probably a particular type of reader who enjoys fiction which examines the drawing room manners and social mores of upper middle class England (the professional class, as opposed to manufacturing/merchant class or aristocracy). I love it, especially when it is delivered with an archly raised eyebrow which questions the assumptions and mores, the hypocrisies of the time. All the better if it can lead you to question the same characteristics of your own time. That is achieved in Galsworthy, in much the same way as Trollope achieved in his Barchester Chronicles in an earlier era.The writing is not without humour, mostly of an ironic kind. The older generation Forsytes, steadfast in their belief in themselves find it almost inconceivable when one amongst their number has the termerity to die! Anyone who thrives on a diet of Trollope, Thackeray, Austen, and anyone who has enjoyed Ian McEwan's more contemporary novel, Atonement should enjoy this. Lovers of the British TV 'costume drama' - think The Cazalets, Love In A Cold Climate, The Way We Live Now - for example, should likewise consider reading Galsworthy.

First book in The Forsyte Saga, the first trilogy about Galsworthy's family, the Forsytes. I have always known that this is a classic; i can remember Mum & Dad watching "The Forsyte Saga" on BBC, when i was under ten. I've thought about reading it at various times since then, when i 've seen parts of the Sage in various libraries, but have never taken the plunge. What a fool i was. This book is wonderful. It is not fast-paced; there is not a lot of action; there aren't thrills and spill for the average modern reader raised on television and motion pictures. What it does have, however, is a delicately portrayed family of characters, nice (in the older sense) irony, gentle interplay between people, and a carefully told story of the disintegration of an engagement, and the loss of a marriage. Very definitely written about the late Victorian Age (it takes place in 1884), some of the people's attitudes are radically (literally, other-rooted) different from the prevailing views of the Western world today. Soames' musings about marriage, the duty of his wife, and his exercise of his rights with her, would not stand today; fascinating they are, though, as a view into our great grandparents' world. Roll on the next two books of the trilogy.