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Vivaldi's Virgins: A Novel Hardcover – July 3, 2007
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In this enthralling new novel, Barbara Quick re-creates eighteenth-century Venice at the height of its splendor and decadence. A story of longing and intrigue, half-told truths and toxic lies, Vivaldi's Virgins unfolds through the eyes of Anna Maria dal Violin, one of the elite musicians cloistered in the foundling home where Antonio Vivaldi—known as the Red Priest of Venice—is maestro and composer.
Fourteen-year-old Anna Maria, abandoned at the Ospedale della Pietà as an infant, is determined to find out who she is and where she came from. Her quest takes her beyond the cloister walls into the complex tapestry of Venetian society; from the impoverished alleyways of the Jewish Ghetto to a masked ball in the company of a king; from the passionate communal life of adolescent girls competing for their maestro's favor to the larger-than-life world of music and spectacle that kept the citizens of a dying republic in thrall. In this world, where for fully half the year the entire city is masked and cloaked in the anonymity of Carnival, nothing is as it appears to be.
A virtuoso performance in the tradition of Girl with a Pearl Earring, Vivaldi's Virgins is a fascinating glimpse inside the source of Vivaldi's musical legacy, interwoven with the gripping story of a remarkable young woman's coming-of-age in a deliciously evocative time and place.
- Print length304 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherHarper
- Publication dateJuly 3, 2007
- Dimensions5.51 x 1.1 x 8.27 inches
- ISBN-100060890525
- ISBN-13978-0060890520
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From Booklist
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Review
“Quick has chosen a fascinating backdrop. Her novel shimmers.…This is a good read.” — Booklist
“Quick’s descriptions of Anna Maria’s violin playing soar off the page, evoking Vivaldi’s own compositions.” — San Francisco Chronicle
“A genuine successor to [Tracy Chevalier’s Girl with a Pearl Earring].” — Houston Chronicle
About the Author
Novelist and poet Barbara Quick is author of Vivaldi's Virgins, translated into 13 languages, made into an audiobook, and in development as a mini-series by Lotus Pictures. Her first novel, Northern Edge, was awarded the Discover: Great New Writers Prize. Her debut book of poems, The Light on Sifnos, won the 2020 Blue Light Press Poetry Prize. She returned to Italy to write A Golden Web, which tells the tale of the pioneering teenage anatomist, Alessandra Giliani. Barbara’s fourth novel, What Disappears (2022), is a multi-generational tale of ballerinas and Jewish history set in Belle Époque Paris. An avid student of other languages, Barbara has traveled the world to do the research for her stories. She and her husband split their time between the Hudson River Valley and the Wine Country of Northern California.
Product details
- Publisher : Harper (July 3, 2007)
- Language : English
- Hardcover : 304 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0060890525
- ISBN-13 : 978-0060890520
- Item Weight : 1.02 pounds
- Dimensions : 5.51 x 1.1 x 8.27 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #2,655,734 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #7,555 in Biographical Fiction (Books)
- #20,451 in Coming of Age Fiction (Books)
- #102,833 in Literary Fiction (Books)
- Customer Reviews:
About the author
I wouldn't trade my job as a novelist and poet for any other job in the world. Writing is a refuge for me--a secret garden, a doorway into other lives, an act that saves my life every single day.
One life has never seemed like enough to me (maybe because I'm a Gemini?). Once I gave up on the idea of acting on the stage, fiction presented itself to me as the next best way for me to experience many more lives than just my own.
With all the translations, especially of VIVALDI'S VIRGINS, my books have brought me into contact with wonderful people from all over the world I would never have met otherwise. I feel so grateful for the readers who have reached out to me over the years, to let me know that my work touched them in some way. That's the highest honor a writer can ever hope for!
Readers are so important to writers--and to literature itself! Buying books is an act of cultural affirmation. Literature--and writers--will perish without readers committed to buying, reading, and talking about books.
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Barbara Quick's novel removes the masks so carefully worn by the upper strata of Venice society. Vivaldi is seen through the eyes of his students and musicians. Vivaldi's Virgins is a combination of first person narrative in which Anna Maria tells her life story and an epistolary novel 'a novel told through letters', a genre emerging in popularity during the 18th century. As a disciplinary measure, Sister Laura instructs Anna Maria to write to calm Anna Maria's growing passion. She writes letters to her unknown mother never knowing whether they will be read nor by whom. Anna Maria lies hidden and almost invisible, living behind a grille from the public. Barbara Quick's novel removes the grille and allows the reader to peer inside the life of this 18th century woman who cries out for her mother and makes Vivaldi's genius heard by his public. Anna Maria dal Violin is the body and the violin through which Vivaldi's music is heard. Images of the voice of the violin and the voice of a child's body maturing merge with the search for her mother and her prayers to the Virgin Mother. A special plot twist at the end will delight all readers. This novel will appeal to a wide range of readers: those craving something of literary beauty, Vivaldi and classical music lovers, women wanting to experience history through the eyes of the women who lived it but for whom history rarely relates their story, and anyone wanting to peek into the lesser known history of Venice or music.
In the tradition of Dante Alighieri and his letters to Beatrice also written without certainty that they would ever be read by the intended reader, Barbara Quick cites this medieval reference, combining it with the 18th century epistolary novel and modernizes both. Although a reader need no knowledge of these literary traditions to enjoy this novel, the thoroughness of the author's research heightens the reading pleasure. The historical detail is well researched and the fictional imagination is breathtaking. The poetic language of each sentence is exquisite. Although I am a fast reader, I found myself reading slowly, creeping actually, but pausing on each page to savor its beauty and poetic prose. It has been 17 years since my graduate studies in literature and I thought I had finally conquered my terrible habit of writing in my books. After reading ten pages of Barbara Quick's Vivaldi's Virgins, I broke down and wrote in the book and continued to the end, rereading each line as I underlined. There is a multitude of passages so beautiful that I want to reread them several times.
Top reviews from other countries
Las alusiones sexuales patéticas, los protagonistas gastados antes de empezar.
Le pongo dos estrellas por la información que aporta de l'ospedale y la epoca (aún así fragmentada )
Francamente no lo recomiendo.
Was wir hier wirklich haben, ist ein schlecht geschriebener Softporno.
Alle musikalischen Waisen dieses Hauses haben ihre Regelblutungen zur gleichen Zeit, was dem Priester Vivaldi in seinen Orchesterproben unangenehm auffällt. Er, dessen Werk durch die männliche Lende inspiriert ist, verzweifelt an der Unschuld seiner jungfräulichen Waisen und deren mangelnder musikalischer Intensität. Dann, durch ein äußeres Ereignis hervorgerufen, geben sich alle musikalischen Jungfrauen der Masturbation hin und in der nächsten Orchesterprobe ist Vivaldi verblüfft von der plötzlichen Tiefe des musikalischen Verständnisses seiner Jungfrauen.
Nach dieser Episode habe ich die Lektüre des Romans abgebrochen. Dieser Buchtitel ist ein Blender unter Vorgabe eines leider nicht existenten historisch-kulturellen Anspruches.