Cassandra opens Pandora's 20th century box perhaps?, 30 Jun 2008
This book has come back to haunt me- several weeks after closing out on the third reading - it's so stimulating it demands reading again and again.
It's an astonishing parabable of the first half of the last century.
Fascinating and disturbing - graphically violent and sexually explicit.
A fable of incredible depth - surreal and symbolic - mixing historical fact with fiction.
A blending of dark fantasy with psychological insight.
Written in phrophetic prose with ominous poetry - it is phantasmorgorical yet convincingly real.
Hallucinatory, dark and magical - unimaginable but believible.
A tragedy unfolds - telling the tale of the gradual demise and eventual degradation of a woman in an increasingly evil world.
Charting her psychosomatic illness, her brief joys and continuous forebodings - her constant sense of doom.
Occassionally harrowing - always rewarding.
If you found this book enthralling - I'm sure you'll be spellbound by Styron's 'Sophie's Choice' and Kosinki's 'Painted Bird' too.

Past, present & future, 03 Aug 2007
A really enjoyable read which takes you on a journey into the fevered mind of a young woman suffering from hysteria as she is treated by the psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud. What I admire about this novel is how skilfully Thomas allows the hidden meanings behind Lisa's hysteria to gradually emerge, but how things sometimes never appear as they seem, with Lisa herself an unreliable witness.

The novel is really a mix of sexual fantasy, buried memories and psychic power. Lisa's pain (left breast/pelvis) and fear to have children are finally revealed as a telepathic anticipation of the horrors of the Second World War and I admire the way Thomas juggles past, present and future in his narrative. It is a psychological puzzle which finally makes horrific sense.

My only criticism of the novel is its final, perhaps sentimental, conclusion. It did not seem to ring true with what preceded it.

Just read it, 18 May 2007
The reviews above say it all, and I have nothing significant to add to them. This is a magnificent book, stunning, a masterpiece. When I first read it, I was gripped by the poetry, the eroticism, and the mounting horror. I read the final chapter with tears streaming down my face. Bruce Kendall's advice is correct - don't read it expecting it to make sense from page 1. Just go with it, and by about half-way through it will start to make sense. By then end you will be staying up all night and turning pages frantically to see how Thomas resolves it. Not an easy book in any way - challenging on many levels, but ultimately life-changing. If you only read one book this year, make it this one. I cannot recommed it highly enough.

Yhe Vision of Love Through Salvation, 19 Feb 2007

"Thomas takes us beyond Freud, beyond Eros and Thanatos, and thus challenges the very substance of the Freudian text. Within the analyses and, he suggests, buried within her individual neurosis, is the subtext of history--the Final Solution. And beyond the horror is the transcendent vision of salvation through love in the mythical state of Israel. In this bold, intellectually challenging novel, Thomas goes beyond both history and historical fiction: he explores the shadowy realm of perception and perceiver with breathtaking vision and artistry." Reviewed by Daniel Weiss, Virginia Quarterly Review

'The White Hotel' is an extraordinary book. It was given the highest recommendation by my best friend, and it is a read I will never forget. It is taken from the case history of Lisa Erdman, an early patient of Sigmund Freud; the book explores her case of sexual hysteria and finds the way to self destructiveness. The scenes with Lisa and Dr.Freud are fascinating. They take her back into childhood and into her dreams. Lisa's erotic dreams are almost visions. They are premonitions to Lisa of death and destruction. Freud helps Lisa to resume her normal life as an opera singer, and we are brought into the world of opera as Lisa finds it. She remarries and settles in the Ukraine with her husband and step-son, and then the unraveling begins. Their harrowing adventures will leave you on the edge. As life as Lisa knows it begins to crumble, so do we.

"Lisa's story is told three times. Once, as a long letter of erotic ramblings by a psychotic, once in image steeped poetry, and finally, as narrative prose, in the dry tone of a doctor discussing a case, complete with musings and asides. By the end of the third rendition, the reader begins to understand something the eminent psychologist never will. That Anna is not only a product of, but a metaphor for the collective fall of European consciousness into madness that still scars the entire century."
T.Rex

'The White Hotel' is much like a mystery, and we are part of the unraveling. I was filled with melancholy and a dream like stance while reading this book. I have not read a book that is so well written. and at the same time lays groundwork of the extraordinary. A trip for Lisa becomes a trip that we will not soon forget. Highly Recommended. prisrob 2-18-07



Stunning and emotional, 30 Jan 2007
In February 1982 I took my first edition hardback copy of The White Hotel to a pub in north London where I saw DM Thomas read from his novel. Afterwards he signed my book. I have never forgotten meeting him. I have read hundreds of novels since my first reading of The White Hotel in 1981, yet none have quite matched the intensity, imagination or sheer daring of this particular story. For anyone who is familiar with Freud's writings, it is sheer poetry to read Thomas's ingenious passages based on the Professor himself. Freud simply comes alive on the pages! It is difficult to write anything new about the holocaust, but The White Hotel has managed to. I believe that a movie is in the making as I write, but I don't think anything will quite match the sparing prose or the moving undercurrents of this book. Be afraid. Be very afraid. But it's worth reading it through to the end so that you can recall the final pages, as I do now, with a sense of sorrow and admiration.

Cassandra opens Pandora's 20th century box perhaps?, 30 Jun 2008
This book has come back to haunt me- several weeks after closing out on the third reading - it's so stimulating it demands reading again and again.
It's an astonishing parabable of the first half of the last century.
Fascinating and disturbing - graphically violent and sexually explicit.
A fable of incredible depth - surreal and symbolic - mixing historical fact with fiction.
A blending of dark fantasy with psychological insight.
Written in phrophetic prose with ominous poetry - it is phantasmorgorical yet convincingly real.
Hallucinatory, dark and magical - unimaginable but believible.
A tragedy unfolds - telling the tale of the gradual demise and eventual degradation of a woman in an increasingly evil world.
Charting her psychosomatic illness, her brief joys and continuous forebodings - her constant sense of doom.
Occassionally harrowing - always rewarding.
If you found this book enthralling - I'm sure you'll be spellbound by Styron's 'Sophie's Choice' and Kosinki's 'Painted Bird' too.

Past, present & future, 03 Aug 2007
A really enjoyable read which takes you on a journey into the fevered mind of a young woman suffering from hysteria as she is treated by the psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud. What I admire about this novel is how skilfully Thomas allows the hidden meanings behind Lisa's hysteria to gradually emerge, but how things sometimes never appear as they seem, with Lisa herself an unreliable witness.

The novel is really a mix of sexual fantasy, buried memories and psychic power. Lisa's pain (left breast/pelvis) and fear to have children are finally revealed as a telepathic anticipation of the horrors of the Second World War and I admire the way Thomas juggles past, present and future in his narrative. It is a psychological puzzle which finally makes horrific sense.

My only criticism of the novel is its final, perhaps sentimental, conclusion. It did not seem to ring true with what preceded it.

Just read it, 18 May 2007
The reviews above say it all, and I have nothing significant to add to them. This is a magnificent book, stunning, a masterpiece. When I first read it, I was gripped by the poetry, the eroticism, and the mounting horror. I read the final chapter with tears streaming down my face. Bruce Kendall's advice is correct - don't read it expecting it to make sense from page 1. Just go with it, and by about half-way through it will start to make sense. By then end you will be staying up all night and turning pages frantically to see how Thomas resolves it. Not an easy book in any way - challenging on many levels, but ultimately life-changing. If you only read one book this year, make it this one. I cannot recommed it highly enough.

Yhe Vision of Love Through Salvation, 19 Feb 2007

"Thomas takes us beyond Freud, beyond Eros and Thanatos, and thus challenges the very substance of the Freudian text. Within the analyses and, he suggests, buried within her individual neurosis, is the subtext of history--the Final Solution. And beyond the horror is the transcendent vision of salvation through love in the mythical state of Israel. In this bold, intellectually challenging novel, Thomas goes beyond both history and historical fiction: he explores the shadowy realm of perception and perceiver with breathtaking vision and artistry." Reviewed by Daniel Weiss, Virginia Quarterly Review

'The White Hotel' is an extraordinary book. It was given the highest recommendation by my best friend, and it is a read I will never forget. It is taken from the case history of Lisa Erdman, an early patient of Sigmund Freud; the book explores her case of sexual hysteria and finds the way to self destructiveness. The scenes with Lisa and Dr.Freud are fascinating. They take her back into childhood and into her dreams. Lisa's erotic dreams are almost visions. They are premonitions to Lisa of death and destruction. Freud helps Lisa to resume her normal life as an opera singer, and we are brought into the world of opera as Lisa finds it. She remarries and settles in the Ukraine with her husband and step-son, and then the unraveling begins. Their harrowing adventures will leave you on the edge. As life as Lisa knows it begins to crumble, so do we.

"Lisa's story is told three times. Once, as a long letter of erotic ramblings by a psychotic, once in image steeped poetry, and finally, as narrative prose, in the dry tone of a doctor discussing a case, complete with musings and asides. By the end of the third rendition, the reader begins to understand something the eminent psychologist never will. That Anna is not only a product of, but a metaphor for the collective fall of European consciousness into madness that still scars the entire century."
T.Rex

'The White Hotel' is much like a mystery, and we are part of the unraveling. I was filled with melancholy and a dream like stance while reading this book. I have not read a book that is so well written. and at the same time lays groundwork of the extraordinary. A trip for Lisa becomes a trip that we will not soon forget. Highly Recommended. prisrob 2-18-07



Stunning and emotional, 30 Jan 2007
In February 1982 I took my first edition hardback copy of The White Hotel to a pub in north London where I saw DM Thomas read from his novel. Afterwards he signed my book. I have never forgotten meeting him. I have read hundreds of novels since my first reading of The White Hotel in 1981, yet none have quite matched the intensity, imagination or sheer daring of this particular story. For anyone who is familiar with Freud's writings, it is sheer poetry to read Thomas's ingenious passages based on the Professor himself. Freud simply comes alive on the pages! It is difficult to write anything new about the holocaust, but The White Hotel has managed to. I believe that a movie is in the making as I write, but I don't think anything will quite match the sparing prose or the moving undercurrents of this book. Be afraid. Be very afraid. But it's worth reading it through to the end so that you can recall the final pages, as I do now, with a sense of sorrow and admiration.

Fascinating, troubling, compelling. Very readable, 13 Jan 2001
We have been accustomed to think of Solzhenitsyn as a hero of our age for his stand against communism. Thomas skilfully and compellingly shows that the truth is far more complex. Solzhenitsyn is a character drawn on a large canvas. He and those around him are flawed, as we all are. This is addressed sympathetically and objectively and the reader left to make up their own mind - a pleasant change from so many other biographies which tell us what to think. The human story is deeply engaging and well presented, but the bigger questions that are raised are at least as compelling. The reader feels the shock of discovery that Solzhenitsyn is NOT a supporter of the modern capitalistic liberal democracy. "Our" way of life is seen as quite as dangerous to humanity as communism. The shallowness of consumerism is impoverishing us all and is the logical outworking of the Enlightenment. Linking Solzhenitsyn's thoughts in this area to Saul Bellow's is particularly interesting - wouldn't it be wonderful to be a fly on the wall if they ever met! Although this book doesn't come into the Five star "must read" category it is excellent, and we must be grateful to Thomas for what he has given us. I would recommend the book to anyone wanting to combine a "good read" with doing some hard thinking about the world we live in.

Cassandra opens Pandora's 20th century box perhaps?, 30 Jun 2008
This book has come back to haunt me- several weeks after closing out on the third reading - it's so stimulating it demands reading again and again.
It's an astonishing parabable of the first half of the last century.
Fascinating and disturbing - graphically violent and sexually explicit.
A fable of incredible depth - surreal and symbolic - mixing historical fact with fiction.
A blending of dark fantasy with psychological insight.
Written in phrophetic prose with ominous poetry - it is phantasmorgorical yet convincingly real.
Hallucinatory, dark and magical - unimaginable but believible.
A tragedy unfolds - telling the tale of the gradual demise and eventual degradation of a woman in an increasingly evil world.
Charting her psychosomatic illness, her brief joys and continuous forebodings - her constant sense of doom.
Occassionally harrowing - always rewarding.
If you found this book enthralling - I'm sure you'll be spellbound by Styron's 'Sophie's Choice' and Kosinki's 'Painted Bird' too.

Past, present & future, 03 Aug 2007
A really enjoyable read which takes you on a journey into the fevered mind of a young woman suffering from hysteria as she is treated by the psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud. What I admire about this novel is how skilfully Thomas allows the hidden meanings behind Lisa's hysteria to gradually emerge, but how things sometimes never appear as they seem, with Lisa herself an unreliable witness.

The novel is really a mix of sexual fantasy, buried memories and psychic power. Lisa's pain (left breast/pelvis) and fear to have children are finally revealed as a telepathic anticipation of the horrors of the Second World War and I admire the way Thomas juggles past, present and future in his narrative. It is a psychological puzzle which finally makes horrific sense.

My only criticism of the novel is its final, perhaps sentimental, conclusion. It did not seem to ring true with what preceded it.

Just read it, 18 May 2007
The reviews above say it all, and I have nothing significant to add to them. This is a magnificent book, stunning, a masterpiece. When I first read it, I was gripped by the poetry, the eroticism, and the mounting horror. I read the final chapter with tears streaming down my face. Bruce Kendall's advice is correct - don't read it expecting it to make sense from page 1. Just go with it, and by about half-way through it will start to make sense. By then end you will be staying up all night and turning pages frantically to see how Thomas resolves it. Not an easy book in any way - challenging on many levels, but ultimately life-changing. If you only read one book this year, make it this one. I cannot recommed it highly enough.

Yhe Vision of Love Through Salvation, 19 Feb 2007

"Thomas takes us beyond Freud, beyond Eros and Thanatos, and thus challenges the very substance of the Freudian text. Within the analyses and, he suggests, buried within her individual neurosis, is the subtext of history--the Final Solution. And beyond the horror is the transcendent vision of salvation through love in the mythical state of Israel. In this bold, intellectually challenging novel, Thomas goes beyond both history and historical fiction: he explores the shadowy realm of perception and perceiver with breathtaking vision and artistry." Reviewed by Daniel Weiss, Virginia Quarterly Review

'The White Hotel' is an extraordinary book. It was given the highest recommendation by my best friend, and it is a read I will never forget. It is taken from the case history of Lisa Erdman, an early patient of Sigmund Freud; the book explores her case of sexual hysteria and finds the way to self destructiveness. The scenes with Lisa and Dr.Freud are fascinating. They take her back into childhood and into her dreams. Lisa's erotic dreams are almost visions. They are premonitions to Lisa of death and destruction. Freud helps Lisa to resume her normal life as an opera singer, and we are brought into the world of opera as Lisa finds it. She remarries and settles in the Ukraine with her husband and step-son, and then the unraveling begins. Their harrowing adventures will leave you on the edge. As life as Lisa knows it begins to crumble, so do we.

"Lisa's story is told three times. Once, as a long letter of erotic ramblings by a psychotic, once in image steeped poetry, and finally, as narrative prose, in the dry tone of a doctor discussing a case, complete with musings and asides. By the end of the third rendition, the reader begins to understand something the eminent psychologist never will. That Anna is not only a product of, but a metaphor for the collective fall of European consciousness into madness that still scars the entire century."
T.Rex

'The White Hotel' is much like a mystery, and we are part of the unraveling. I was filled with melancholy and a dream like stance while reading this book. I have not read a book that is so well written. and at the same time lays groundwork of the extraordinary. A trip for Lisa becomes a trip that we will not soon forget. Highly Recommended. prisrob 2-18-07



Stunning and emotional, 30 Jan 2007
In February 1982 I took my first edition hardback copy of The White Hotel to a pub in north London where I saw DM Thomas read from his novel. Afterwards he signed my book. I have never forgotten meeting him. I have read hundreds of novels since my first reading of The White Hotel in 1981, yet none have quite matched the intensity, imagination or sheer daring of this particular story. For anyone who is familiar with Freud's writings, it is sheer poetry to read Thomas's ingenious passages based on the Professor himself. Freud simply comes alive on the pages! It is difficult to write anything new about the holocaust, but The White Hotel has managed to. I believe that a movie is in the making as I write, but I don't think anything will quite match the sparing prose or the moving undercurrents of this book. Be afraid. Be very afraid. But it's worth reading it through to the end so that you can recall the final pages, as I do now, with a sense of sorrow and admiration.

Fascinating, troubling, compelling. Very readable, 13 Jan 2001
We have been accustomed to think of Solzhenitsyn as a hero of our age for his stand against communism. Thomas skilfully and compellingly shows that the truth is far more complex. Solzhenitsyn is a character drawn on a large canvas. He and those around him are flawed, as we all are. This is addressed sympathetically and objectively and the reader left to make up their own mind - a pleasant change from so many other biographies which tell us what to think. The human story is deeply engaging and well presented, but the bigger questions that are raised are at least as compelling. The reader feels the shock of discovery that Solzhenitsyn is NOT a supporter of the modern capitalistic liberal democracy. "Our" way of life is seen as quite as dangerous to humanity as communism. The shallowness of consumerism is impoverishing us all and is the logical outworking of the Enlightenment. Linking Solzhenitsyn's thoughts in this area to Saul Bellow's is particularly interesting - wouldn't it be wonderful to be a fly on the wall if they ever met! Although this book doesn't come into the Five star "must read" category it is excellent, and we must be grateful to Thomas for what he has given us. I would recommend the book to anyone wanting to combine a "good read" with doing some hard thinking about the world we live in.

Fantastic!, 02 Nov 2002
This is an awesome book, deserving of far more attention than its had. Funny, challenging, and very erotic. It takes Freuds psychoanalysis (something which rears it's head in most of Thomas' books) and turns it back onto Freud himself and his family with devastating aplomb. This guy is a major writer, and this is one of his finest books.