The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone - Softcover

Williams, Tennessee

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0811221458 ISBN 13: 9780811221450

Publisher: New Directions, 2013

Synopsis

Tennessee Williams's first novel

The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone is vintage Tennessee Williams. Published in 1950, his first novel was acclaimed by Gore Vidal as "splendidly written, precise, short, complete, and fine." It is the story of a wealthy, fiftyish American widow recently a famous stage beauty, but now "drifting." The novel opens soon after her husband's death and her retirement from the theatre, as Mrs. Stone tries to adjust to her aimless new life in Rome. She is adjusting, too, to aging. ("The knowledge that her beauty was lost had come upon her recently and it was still occasionally forgotten.") With poignant wit and his own particular brand of relish, Williams charts her drift into an affair with a cruel young gigolo: "As compelling, as fascinating, and as technically skillful as his play" (Publishers Weekly).

About this title

About the Author:

Tennessee Williams (1911-1983) is the acclaimed author of many books of letters, short stories, poems, essays, and a large collection of plays, including The Glass Menagerie, A Streetcar Named Desire, Camino Real, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Orpheus Descending, The Night of the Iguana, and The Rose Tattoo.

From Library Journal:

pap.* $6. F The noted playwright took his first plunge into fiction with this 1950 novel. Reminiscent of his brand of drama, the plot follows an older woman's romantic involvement with a younger man in the great Italian capital. At the time of its debut, LJ 's reviewer praised the book for its "splendid characterization" ( LJ 9/1/50). This newest installment in New Directions' "Bibelot" series should be in all fiction collections.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: New Directions
• Publication date: 2013
• ISBN 10: 0811221458
• ISBN 13: 9780811221450
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 160