Excellent character study of a totally self-absorbed "Edwardian" novelist who unaccountably inspired great loyalty in a number of people who saw her flaws and loved her anyway, through thick and thin.
2008 ( )

This book started off strong, with an antagonistic main character, Angel, who is so full of herself you can't help but be amused. After all, she is only fifteen. She has a bad day at school, and takes to her bed, pretending to be sick. She prolongs this by deciding to write a novel - in bed. She's convinced she is a genius, despite the fact she has little life knowledge, no background in reading any books at all, and a horrific vocabulary full of big words she uses incorrectly.

And she gets published. And a certain segment of the population loves her books. And she becomes rich.

And then I got bored. Angel's adult life didn't really interest me at all, so the second half of this novel didn't really work for me. For me, this was one of the less interesting books that NYRB has published. ( )

I have to be honest. I had never heard of the author Elizabeth Taylor until I joined the 75-Book Challenge group. I started seeing her books popping up on threads here and there, and the reviews intrigued me. So I went looking at the library, and Angel was the first one I grabbed at random.

It's always interesting to read a book in which the main character is not particularly likable. Angel is a novelist, a writer of the worst sort of overwrought, overwritten romance. She is seemingly oblivious to the contempt in which critics and her own publisher hold her, and is convinced that her books are fine literature. To the consternation of the critics (and the cynical pleasure of the publishers), Angel's books are hugely popular, bringing her the kind of wealth and fame she only dreamed about as a poor child.

Angel tramples on the feelings of the people in her life and is generally an unlikable personality. And yet, I couldn't help feeling sad and a touch of pity for her at the end of this novel, which is a compliment to Taylor's writing. I plan to seek out other Taylor novels in the future. I do hope some of them have some more pleasant protagonists, however. ( )

I read Elizabeth Taylor's Angel and I have to ask how in the world did Taylor create such a completely unlikable character in a book I ended up loving? Doesn't make sense. I should've hated this book because well, Angel is absolutely toxic. But Taylor's writing is so gobsmacking beautiful and descriptive that it's hard to get beyond that. Plus it's her genius, I think, that could create a character that's so repellent while being so absolutely fascinating. I won't soon forget her.

"At that first meeting, long ago in London, she had seemed to need his protection while warning him not to offer it: arrogant and absurd she had been and had remained: she had warded off friendship and stayed lonely and made such fortifications within her own mind that the truth could not pierce it. At the slightest air of censure in the world about her, up had gone the barricades, the strenuous resistance begun by which she was preserved in her own imagination, beautiful, clever, successful and beloved." ( )

Elisabeth Taylor dresse le portrait d'Angel, un personnage qui dédie sa vie entière à l'écriture, de l'adolescence jusqu'à sa mort.
Difficile de porter plus mal son nom : Angel est une héroïne froide, mégalomane et entièrement absorbée par elle-même, même si elle jette un jour son dévolu sur un beau jeune homme, peintre raté et fantasque, incapable de s'attacher à qui que ce soit. Celle qui lui sera dévouée jusqu'à la mort, c'est la soeur de ce jeune homme, qui décide de devenir sa dame de compagnie, sa servante, sa comptable et son souffre-douleur.
Très jeune, Angel trouve le succès en écrivant des livres baroques, anachroniques, peuplés de têtes couronnées et d'aventures improbables. Avant de tomber peu à peu dans la pauvreté (ses fariboles trouvant de moins en moins leur public), elle devient très riche, ce qui l'aide à épouser l'homme qu'elle convoite.
L'écriture du roman est à l'image de son personnage : froide et acérée. Elisabeth Taylor trempe sa plume dans une encre ironique. So british...
Heureusement, elle écrit bien car elle a créé dans ce roman un personnage tellement insupportable qu'il est difficile d'y habiter. Le pauvre lecteur finit assez rapidement par suffoquer et souhaiter trouver meilleure compagnie ailleurs.
Une curiosité.

Extraits :
"Until now she had thought of love with bleak distaste. She wanted to dominate the world, not one person".
(A propos de Lord Norley) : "He was always kind to human beings, in the manner of a man who does not like dogs but would not countenance any cruelty to one. He gave them his time and some of his attention. Restless shadows, they moved before him. He handed them prizes, counted their votes, raised his hat to them in the street, dined with them, attended their funerals".
(A propos du jeune peintre raté) : "His life had been hindered by his beauty and the adventures it had permitted him. THe adventures had all been expensive of money and of fortitude, and were beginning to be expensive of the beauty itself". ( )