The first thing I noticed when reading the book is that it is very much a character study of these dozen or so characters; you learn about their pasts, families, and present piece by piece, building up a clear picture of who these people are. You also know who is going to die at some point and eventually how. My favourite part of ‘Symposium’ was the insertions of paragraphs about the dinner party that these people are attending, the food they are eating, the conversations that take place. It is a good indicator to how these people mingle and get on with each other.I definitely wouldn’t say that this is a quick read by any means but it is definitely an easy one that builds with interest as it goes along. I would say that at some points the plot seemed to swap and change between times and places very quickly making it a bit difficult to keep up but at no point did I feel overwhelmed by it. I noticed that in some parts, as the story was getting to a touchy or more difficult subject matter, the subject of conversation would change and I really loved how that reflected the politeness of the characters and emphasised how taboo certain subject matters were.I was unsure throughout this book about the setting with regards to time. It felt very old-fashioned in some ways and yet some of the ideas shown were quite modern. ‘Symposium’ was originally published in 1990 and I really think that it feels like a much older book, almost with a classic feel.I loved the mystery and the way all of these characters were intertwined, but it became quite slow and dragged a bit towards the end. The plot seemed to divert away from the main story line of the dinner and delved deep into one of the character’s backgrounds. Although this was quite informative with regards to the plot, it began to lose my interest eventually.I actually really liked the ending and overall enjoyed the book but it’s not one of my favourites. I will definitely be picking up more of Muriel Spark’s work in the future as I loved the writing style and the idea of the story, I just think that I wasn’t in the right mood for this book at the time.
This is another book I read for a satire class in college. Like the fonts and colors on the cover of my edition, it's a confusing little puzzle box of characters, nuns, witchcraft, pissy walls, and a murder. It sounds ridiculous, and it's justifiably funny and satirical. Unexamined lives and marriages along with class feuding are the core targets of Symposium's satire, and the connections to Plato's Symposium are genuinely well thought out but are accessible enough to create a hilarious story. And while that's interesting and while being caricatures, the characters make sense in context, the book snowballs with it's content pretty quickly. I found it difficult to read quickly because of how many dinner guests get introduced in rapid succession, but that also might be because of the fact that I had to read the book within two days and I wasn't able to pick up on every tidbit of the biting satire. However from what I did read closely, I was quite disappointed by the under usage of the ironically secular and Marxist nuns in the novel. They were the best part to me and only played a small part in the novel as a whole. It could have been used or fleshed out more and become homogenous with the rest of the story, but it's sadly only loosely connected to the murder plot. The rest of this little satire was great, but I would have liked it more if it had been better connected.
Do You like book Symposium: A Novel (2006)?
The plot of Symposium weaves around a dinner party given by artist Hurley Reed and his companion, Chris Donovan. Their dinners are reknown for both the quality of the food and of the people there. And the staff- the chef, the butler, the servers- are all impeccably polite. All is not quiet in this rarified world, though- there have been a string of burglaries lately amoung their set, and there is a new member of their group. Margaret Murchie has recently become Margaret Damien, and she comes with a past that includes mysterious dispperances and deaths and an uncle who lives in an asylum who gives the family good advice. Mostly good advice. The story jumps around in time, sometimes being the night of the dinner, sometimes in the pasts of the various diners. In this way, we learn the backstories of them all, especially that of Margaret. We also learn about Hilda Damien, Margaret’s new mother-in-law. She is wealthy and is visiting from Australia to settle the newlyweds with a flat as a wedding present. She is to join the group after dinner, but sadly is detained by her own murder. It’s an entirely entertaining novel, satirical and witty, funny and dreadful at the same time.
—Laurie
I have no problem accepting the premise that "Less is More" in contemporarly architecture, but when it comes to Muriel Spark, more is definitely more.I am on a bit of a Muriel Spark bender: this is my third of her novels this week (they are short!)and I have enjoyed each one more than the last. I don't necessarily think that Symposium was superior to the others (the Bachelors and Loitering With Intent)but rather buy into the premise that there is a cumulative sympathy building for her sense of humor, very quirky characters, and fresh, very readable novels.I am having great fun reading Muriel Spark and wonder why it has taken so long for me to discover her work.
—Nancy
I have read a couple of Muriel Spark’s novels before and enjoyed them immensely, so when I turned to this one I had a general idea of what to expect. Sadly, this time around, it didn't quite work for me. Symposium is a story of a dinner party in Islington held by a collection of posh people. Throughout the novel we get introduced to their many problems and romantic difficulties and the narrative dances freely around the lives of these characters and I found it rather difficult to keep track of where we were (pre-dinner party, during dinner party, post-dinner party). The characters were well drawn, though the plot switched about so often their presence in the novel felt fleeting rather than substantial. The inclusion of a murder plot unleashed a whole new swarm of wasps and continue to complicate matters.This isn’t a terrible novel, there is a lot of clever trademark Spark stuff going on here, but I couldn’t help feeling a tad disappointed by its overall effect. Clever, but not entirely successful.
—Barnaby
