So lovely to finally hear this voice. I was introduced to Rhys by one of my lit professors and went on to read all her work. I eventually chose her as the subject for my graduate thesis. The term that always comes to mind when I consider Rhys' work is "unflinching."
I always wanted to hear Rhys speak. I wanted to hear her accent more than anything else. It was something that had always caused her trouble but she never did shed it. I love the words in the audio which sound different from a regular English accent, after so many years, it still feels rebelling. She's a delight to those who do not belong, to the ones who are and will remain outsiders.
I got a collection of all of her novels about ten years ago. I read all of her novels in succession in under two days, and in the coming weeks, read them all again two more times. Although male, I relate to her misanthropic misfitism, and her struggle with the dollar, and for real relationships. Being a person of color in america, I love that she loves, respects, and relates to the colored side of herself. Jean Rhys was a very brave woman.
I never knew that Jean Rhys lived for years in Cheriton Fitzpaine, Devon. Near Crediton. It's a tiny hamlet of very few people, hidden away in the Devon wilderness, the sort of place you will find ancient cobb long houses, and an old rusty, abandoned farm tractor. Yet, it's only 8 miles from where I write this, at Cowley, on the northern edge of Exeter, the county city. In Jean Rhys's writings, I can detect a little of George Gissing, and the ignored, and dispossesed.
Doing a Masters degree and my dissertation is on Jean Rhys. Every time I get stuck I listen to this recording to inspire me to continue. She may have been the most frustrating of women and certainly no feminist but she recognised the harshness of the female condition in her day as no other...
It is touching indeed, and striking too. One thinks an author should sound a particular way -- Virginia Woolf should sound upper class, somewhat fee, fluty -- and her voice sounds quite deep and assertive. Jean Rhys sounds girlish, like an ingenue, quite surprising. Thank you, Thomas Marcus Beardmore, for posting this, very valuable.
I've been longing to hear a recording of Jean Rhys speaking for years (my sister wrote a book about her work, "Ferocious Things"). Thank you so so much. XX
At drama school she was told she would have to shed her West Indies accent to get roles. Though, of course, they put it less politely than that. You can still hear it here and there.
Happiness like Love is an idea, and we are in love with the idea. There can be no happiness in a world like this in which we find ourselves. Freedom from struggle and distress equates to what most of us would settle for within this mortal lifespan. And after we are gone, so will be all our concerns and happiness has nothing to do with any of it. Some people like JR, whether they be writers, artists or whatever, instinctively know The Reality of being born into this turning planet, and they try as best they can to convey such a reality, primarily as a means of getting through it for themselves. Worldly success may well come as a result of what they convey and express artistically, but in a sense that is all by the way. And then of course - and this is the irony - they may well find themselves in the 'Illusion of Happiness.'
Dulce Navarro I’m not capable of that, but I can tell you that she is talking about happiness, the general absence of it in her life- except for brief periods of time. She believes that sustained happiness is something rare for the vast majority of people, not only herself. She also says that we shouldn’t confuse peacefulness with happiness.
