Name: The Portrait
Rating: 3.75 (2 reviews)
ISBN: 9780786278756

Iain Pears

Iain M. Pears

Tale of vengeance set in an island of the coast of Brittany. A painter, Henry MacAlpine, paints a portrait of an art critic. The book is a monologue by the painter during the painting process, revealing past lives, loves and grudges.

The Portrait

Set against the dramatic, untamed landscape of Brittany during one of the most explosive periods in art history, "The Portrait" is rich with atmosphere and suggestion, psychological complexity, and marvelous detail.

Laura Mauler

This book is written in the first person and involves no dialog between the characters, instead relying on a combination of the narrator's monologue, responses to "anticipated" questions on the part of the other person, and narrator's recollections in order to move the plot forward. It sounds weird but is fun to read.

Journeying to a remote French island to sit for a portrait that is painted by his tormented artist friend, an influential London art critic recalls the early years of their friendship, his own influence over aspiring artists, and the power struggle between subject and artist in the course of the sitting. By the author of An Instance of the Fingerpost. Reprint. 100,000 first printing.

Aage Vetter

Interesting premise. Well written, too, with a number of quotable lines and ideas on art theory, relevance, and relationships.

That said, I wish I had been warned in advance that this book is written entirely as a one-sided monologue, which never diverts and drones on and on until the predictable finish.

In the words of Henry McAlpine, “You’re not really interested in how I came to live on this island, are you? …. But I’ll tell you anyway. It will be your punishment”.

Andrew John Kinney

Very suspenseful, and an interesting history of art in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries.

The Portrait

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