Από τα καλύτερα βιβλία που διάβασα το τελευταίο διάστημα!! Το ξεκίνησα εχθές με μία επιφύλαξη αλλά σήμερα που το συνέχισα διαψεύσθηκα. Η Chevalier ξεδιπλώνει μια ιστορία , με τα ελάχιστα στοιχεία που είναι γνωστά από ιστορικής άποψης, με αριστοτεχνικό τρόπο. Οι ήρωες, τα γεγονότα, όλα μπλέκονται μεταξύ τους με τέτοιον τρόπο ώστε μοιάζουν με ενιαίο σύνολο που πράγματι κάποτε συνέβη και δεν φαίνεται να αποτελούν αποκύημα της φαντασίας της συγγραφέως. Οι σελίδες κυλούν πολύ εύκολα και ενώ από την μία πλευρά εύχεσαι να τελειώσει για να μάθεις τι θα γίνει από την άλλη δεν θες να αποχωριστείς τους χαρακτήρες.
Ο Νικολά ντεζ Ινοσέν υπήρξε ο αγαπημένος μου παρά τον επιπόλαιο χαρακτήρα του. Δεν νευρίασα μαζί του και μάλιστα στεναχωρήθηκα που δεν μπόρεσε να είναι μαζί με την αγαπημένη του. Παρά τον αυθορμητισμό που τον διακατείχε και την απερισκεψία κάποιες φορές, δεν μπόρεσε να μου δημιουργήσει αρνητικά συναισθήματα. Γρήγορα μάλιστα παρατήρησα στροφή στον χαρακτήρα του , κυρίως μετά το πρώτο ταξίδι του στις Βρυξέλλες. Λυπήθηκα για τον ανεκπλήρωτο ωστόσο έρωτά του. Όπως επίσης λυπήθηκα και την Κλόντ. Μια ηρωίδα υποταγμένη στις αποφάσεις και τα θέλω της μητέρας της που αγνοούσε όμως τα αισθήματα του ίδιου της του παιδιού σκόπιμα στερώντας της την χαρά που και η ίδια δεν κατόρθωσε να ζήσει. Την αντιπάθησα τόσο πολύ που ήθελα να σκίσω τις σελίδες που διάβαζα ώρες ώρες. Έβαλε την κόρη της στο μοναστήρι για να την προστατεύσει από έναν "επικίνδυνο" ζωγράφο που, κατά την γνώμη μου, αγαπούσε αληθινά την νεαρή κοπέλα. Ήταν ασυγχώρητη. Υποτίθεται ό,τι έκανε ήταν προς όφελος της Κλόντ αλλά μόνο έτσι δεν ήταν τα πράγματα. Ήθελε να στερήσει την χαρά και την αγάπη από την κόρη της για έναν απλό λόγο (που και η ίδια γνώριζε): την ζήλια. Που η Κλόντ βρήκε κάποιον να αγαπά και που την αγαπάει εν αντιθέση με εκείνη που έμεινε δεσμευμένη σε έναν αποτυχημένο γάμο. Οι καλές προθέσεις της φάνηκαν και στο τέλος εξάλλου καθώς αφήνεται να εννοηθεί πως ούτε η Κλόντ αλλά ούτε και ο Νικολά έζησαν ευτυχισμένοι.
Παρά το τέλος , το βιβλίο μου άφησε μια ευχάριστη αίσθηση και την επιθυμία να διαβάσω και άλλα βιβλία της συγγραφέως !

I suppose that's how you write historical fiction (looking at you, Simone van der Vlugt!)

The Brussels section is glorious, with all the weaving details and the particulars of the craft. I'm beyond amazed each time an author takes the hard way and engages in lots of research, such as tapestry techniques in the Middle Ages—setting up looms, threads, colours, dyeing methods and all that jazz—and manages to bring everything together in an enthralling narrative. Also, I'm constantly amazed at how incredibly well the craft guilds were organized in Medieval Flanders.

The Paris section is a bit trivial, but somewhat appropriate, I guess?

Unfortunately, I didn't connect with any of the characters (definitely didn't root for the unlikely pair), but having the story told from multiple pov certainly helped with shaping and depth.

“I feel like a bird who has been wounded with an arrow and now cannot fly.”

"They remind me of what I was like before, all light and happy and free. Only the one where the unicorn lies in her lap is like me now."

I don't know why I prolong some books. Its not because I don't like them, I guess I just don't know how I feel about them and need to let them marinate for a while to really get my feel for them. This was one of those books. (Law& Order's duh duh.)

So this is the fourth book of Chevalier's that I've read. I really liked Girl With the Pearl Earring and her two books Remarkable Creatures and Newboy ranged from okay to god awful. This book was the deciding factor if Tracey Chevalier was a one hit wonder for me or not. Luckily she still has a few tricks up her sleeve and can still weave a tale. I really like stories that involve or are about art (etc. Girl With the Pearl Earring, The Gold Finch..) so this book had more than just proving Chevalier was a good writer, but a good weaver of a theme that I love. (See what I did there?)

For the uninitiated The Lady and the Unicorn is about the famous tapestries from the 15th century and (like her previous work) a fictional story made up to fill out the background that is lost to history. The only 'historical' characters in this book are the Le Viste family and like two ladies in waiting. But like any story that is well crafted it's the characters that bolster history's reality, in this story's case that man's name is Nicolas Des Innocents. Or if you prefer...


(My favorite of the Chris's)

Not three pages into the the book it's revealed that the lovable rogue has impregnated a poor servant girl. He has little sympathy for her, even blames her, gives her a few coins and flirts with another girl right in front of her. This comes back to bite him in the ass later, but it doesn't really stop him from what his true drive is which is of course painting. Des Innocents is commissioned by the Le Viste family to create the now famous unicorn tapestries, but he is only the designer the weavers are the other half of the story (as well as the narrative) and play a major part into Des Innocents character development.

I really loved the ending of this book, it gives the full shape of the novel and the view points of the women who play a major role in shaping the theme of the tapestries. Touch, Sound, Smell, Sight, Taste, and Mon Seul Desir. Des Innocents says at the end that he "had gotten all the ladies wrong." But I think it was more of a growth of character and seeing them for more than just their facial beauty. Especially with Claude, a girl Des Innocents wanted the most, she returned his feelings but in the end gave into her destiny. As she said "In a place that is a paradise to Maman and a prison to me. That is what a lady's life is after all.." Des Innocents, ironic as his name was was the unicorn in his paintings. He was tamed in the end.

"I feel as if these women have changed me somehow.."

Was hoping to enjoy The Lady and the Unicorn after reading Burning Bright a few years earlier, which is, to be honest, far superior to this. After the action moves away from the Le Viste family, it kind of goes downhill from there. Nicholas is thoroughly unlikeable as a character (whether this was meant to be deliberate or not, I couldn't tell). The only interesting person was Genevieve de Nanterre. Also, what's the deal with Chevalier missing out on the chance to use Jean Le Viste's narrative voice? He is the reason the tapestry is made at all, but we only get a few glimpses of him being little more than a stereotype (of the "I'm-so-damn-important-that-I'll-blame-my-lack-of-an-heir-on-my-wife-simply-because-no-one-will-dare-argue-with-me" variety) and all round bastard. Aside from all this, the writing is clunky. Nicholas leers after any woman with a pulse (including fourteen year old girls) and comes out with cringeworthy lines such as "The sight of her tongue made me hard. I wanted to plough her" and "Come closer, my dear, and see my plums. Squeeze them." Had the writing been less like a Mills & Boon novel it could have just about saved this book. Oh, well. I'm hoping Remarkable Creatures is going to turn out better.

I am impressed. I never thought this book would be as lovely as Girl with a Pearl Earring: http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...! First let me just explain that this is a book of historical fiction. In the Museé National du Moyen-Age we can today see the Lady and the Unicorn tapestries. They are six tapestries, each representing one of our five senses:
sight, sound, smell, touch, taste and the sixth, that one is known as Á Mon Seul Désir, for these words are found woven there. In English the translation would be: my one, sole desire. Think about those words in conjunction with the theme of the other tapestries and imagine what they might mean. In any case, the tapestries and this book must be about seduction. Or is it about forgoing sensual pleasures? One cannot see if the women is putting in or taking out the jewels.

Little is known of these wool and silk tapestries except that they were woven at the end of the 1400s, probably in Flanders. They were commissioned by the Le Visté family, since the banner is visible in all six of the tapestries. Tracy Chevalier weaves a credible story about these tapestries: Jean Le Visté, a fifteenth-century nobleman, close to the French King Charles VII, commissions Nicolas des Innocents, a talented miniaturist, tantalized by the charms of several beautiful women - maids, ladies-in-waiting and even Jean Le Visté’s daughter and wife, too. The tapestries are woven in Brussels by the renown weaver Georges de la Chapelle. The story captures the lives and times of noblemen and the guilds’ craftsmen living in Brussels and Paris at the end of the 1400s.

Tracy Chevalier, the author, has done her homework. She knows these cities, the craftsmen and these times – down to the smallest details. She knows that in Brussels it is the early summer sun that shines the hottest:

I sat back on my heels and raised my face to the sun. Early summer is good for sun, as it is directly overhead for longer during the day. I have always loved heat, though not from the fire. Fires scare me. I have singed my skirts too often by the fire.

‘Will you pick me a strawberry, Mademoiselle?’ Nicolas asked. ‘I have a thirst.’

‘They’re not ripe yet,’ I snapped. I had meant to sound pleasant but he made me feel strange. And he was talking too loudly. People often do when they discover I am blind….. (pages 110-111: a short interchange of words between Nicolas and Aliénor de la Chapelle, the pretty, but blind daughter of Geroges de la Chapelle)

Already we know by 100 pages that Nicolas has impregnated a maid in Paris, been under a table doing naughty things with fourteen-year-old Claude, the daughter of Jean Le Visté, and flirted with her mother, Geneviève de Nanterre. What more mischief and indeed with whom will we find Nicolas? Each character has a clear identity. There is rivalry between mother and daughter; there is jealousy and love too. Each of the women came alive. There is Aliénor the blind girl. There is Christine du Sablon, the wife of Georges and mother of Aliénor. Each of the women and also the men relate the events. Different chapters relate different characters’ thoughts. Each of the individuals has a different perspective. Each has their own problems, personality and standing and thus they cannot have the same view. I loved the blind girl’s thoughts. I also appreciated the two different mother daughter relationships. For me, there was a lot to consider. I love the playful seduction scenes. I love the authenticity of the descriptions. I know Brussels and the author describes the city perfectly. The details are interwoven into the tale of families. There is a wife that has given birth to only three daughters, and that is quite a failing when it is a son that is needed to carry on the family name. This novel is about not only the tapestries but also about women, several very different women. So while we learn history about these tapestries and times we also delve into familiar family relationships. The book is about rivalry between mothers and daughters, lost love between a husband and wife and about the life of women as they age. What makes it wonderful to read is the author’s ability to evoke different places and characters convincingly.

As always, Chevalier writes about the obsessive power of art, sexuality, and (women's) agency with a force that is unparalleled in historical fiction. In some ways, The Lady and the Unicorn is even more impressive than her best-known work, Girl with a Pearl Earring, as her ability to give voice to women - influential in the creation of art and yet marginalized throughout history - is flexed in not just one central character, but three or four. My favourites: Claude, obviously, the best fourteen year-old with a SEX DRIVE, Alienor with her garden, Christine and her desire to weave, and Genevieve, whose confession ('mon seul desir') eventually makes its way into the tapestry of the title.

Reading this book has reminded me of how much I just love Tracy Chevalier.

This book has been on my TBR for a while and the synopsis intrigued me. But I actually chose to read it, due to Decades Bingo, as it is a 2003 publish. I give it about 3.5 stars, and I enjoyed it. It had an interesting structure, as the story moves through 7 or 8 points of view as it is being told. I found that interesting. The story of course is of a series of six tapestries in the house of Jean Le Viste, that depict the story of The Lady and the Unicorn, which is a story of seduction. This book is the story of what might have happened to both inspire the series, as well as during its development and manufacture. And of course, these ladies have to deal with power and seduction during the course of the project and the book. I thought it was well done. It was different and I enjoyed it.

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This is my favorite book of Chevalier's next to the Girl with a Pearl Earring... I loved stepping into the medieval setting and learning the intricacies of creating those gorgeous tapestries I've seen hanging in the Cloisters of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The characters are great, and the story line has less tragedy, which I preferred.

You can tell from the first few pages that the author really did her homework on the history of tapestries. Everything is very well-documented, from how exactly a tapestry was made to the usual way a Belgian workshop was organized and run. (The best medieval workshops for tapestries were in Belgium).

It's lovely that Tracy Chevalier thought of a way to explain the famous unicorn tapestries in Cluny and how they came to be. Her knowledge of the art world in Paris and how everything was commissioned is also impressive.

I also appreciated a sense of realism regarding the characters and their relations. The motif of the lady and the unicorn may be one of the most poetic themes in the world, but most of the times the characters in the book are decidedly prosaic. The only thing I could wish for more was that the ending was less neatly rounded off (the final twist was a bit unnecessary, in my opinion).

Prvo, ali ne i zadnje druženje sa Tracy :)

Threads of history and fiction interestingly woven together, creating colourful symbolism and story telling.
I have always admired this tapestry and will surely revisit it with new eyes and wonder.