Product Description

In death, as in life, Elizabeth Hunter remains a callous, destructive vivisector of the lives around her, as her son and daughter convene at her deathbed in a Sydney suburb, and her housekeeper, nurses and solicitor dance attendance.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1164641 in Books
• Published on: 1995-11-16
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 592 pages

Customer Reviews

A dark voyage
Patrick, the greatest novelist to have come out of Australia, had already produced a number of classic novels by the time he released "The Eye of the Storm" in 1973- the year that also saw him win the Nobel Prize for Literature.
It is to his credit as a writer that rather than merely repeating the formula of these past successes he explored new territory in terms of style, characterisation and theme with this book.
He had made his reputation by writing about the inner journeys of individuals struggling to find spiritual enlightment in the relentlessly materialistic world of Australia. His heroes had included a ragtag bunch of fascinating outsiders- the mad old nature mystic Miss Hare, neglected Aboriginal artist Alf Dubbo and a visionary explorer in "Voss". In these earlier books White seemed to be suggesting that the mindless fascination with wealth, property and normalcy that pervaded Australian society only left room for individuals to explore deeper issues of spiritual meaning and significance out on the fringes.
It comes as a surprise then that in "The Eye of the Storm", White's heroine is wealthy society woman, Elizabeth Hunter, who seems to embody everything that he most abhored about Australia. The novel explores the life of Elizabeth Hunter through the relationships she has had over many years with a variety of characters, including her lovers, children and servants. The heroine may have been based on Patrick White's own mother and she is presented as essentially destructive in her insistence on dominating others.
The novel is much less religious in its outlook than White's early books. One reviewer described "Riders in the Chariot" as more of a "mystical essay" than a novel but such a description could not be applied to "The Eye of the Storm". Like its heroine, the novel is less mystical and more worldly than what White had given us before. "The Eye of the Storm" is centred more in the painful, toxic relationships that exist between members of a dysfunctional family than in issues of spiritual transcendence. Eventually, during a tropical storm in Queensland, Elizabeth Hunter does experience a moment of spiritual epiphany but this time the heroine is out of her element. She is a stranger to this world and hardly knows what to make of it.
The Nobel Committe had been put off awarding the Prize for Literature to White in 1970 because of the bleak, cynical presentation he had given of the way artists use other people to create art. After all, The Nobel Prize, is supposed to be given to literature of an 'idealistic' nature. It seems fanciful however to think that "The Eye of the Storm" offers a rosier view of human nature than its predecessor. In exploring the emotional wreckage that comes out families and such dark themes as incest, both emotional and physical, "The Eye of the Storm" is unlikely to leave readers with a warm, inner glow. But it may appeal to an audience who like literary fiction which take big chances with language, style and theme. Whilst not one of his best three or four books, it is still rich and rewarding.

His master work
Luck would have it that he got the noble prize for this book that holds all of his styles.If anyone wants to read White start here.In this book you get it all.You wont finish this book the way you started life.I am surprised there are only two reviews to this book.I have read a lot and this is at the very top; if anyone out there aspires to write , read this.He has a depth of language and metaphore and craftmanship (a perfectionism that comes out in his biography) that is with the worlds very very best.Its a fabulous read ,and superb.One or two pages of this book consume the books most other writers.Perhaps thats why there are few reviews.Frankly, they won't hold a candle to him.And the descriptions in the stories are superb , 20 later you will hold the vision like a movie.The 'Eye of the storm' has hundreds of threads but I still remember Whites description of cyclone coming onto Fraser Is and of the Dolls head being pulled off and of and of and of etc etc etc .This book is the best of Worlds best.

Tempest In A Teapot
Let's put our cards on the table, shall we? This is NOT one of Patrick White's, Australia's only Nobel Prize winner, better works. What White specialises in and does as no other writer can do, is hone in with a laser-like focus on the life of the ordinary man with such intensity that what it means to be an "ordinary" human being becomes a quiet, deep mystery which gradually seeps through the pages into one, a Revelation (capital intended), no less, by the time the reader turns the final pages in rapt admiration. The Tree of Man, I think, is his best work in this regard, in any regard, with Riders in the Chariot a not so close second.

Here, to put it simply, White spreads himself too thin, very much too thin. Instead of one individual, or a very few individuals, we have an entire cast of rather unlikely, nay, unbelievable characters.

Elizabeth Hunter-The dying (once stunning, still wealthy) woman who serves as the eponymous "eye of the storm," though calm she is certainly not.

Sir Basil- Her son, who somehow (It is never disclosed.) has fled Australia, and won himself a knighthood in England for his acting. One simply assumes that it's his acting. What else could it be?

Dorothy-Her daughter, who has likewise fled Australia and become, rather than an English knight, a French Princess.

Various nurses, attendants and hangers-on in general also populate this book, and receive the full, patented, in-depth psychological portrait by White. .

And instead of the rural Aussie dialect of his other books, we have a salmagundi of various languages and English dialects: City Australian, Rural Australian, Pommy English, French (from Her Highness) and German, from a Jewish housekeeper who has escaped the Holocaust. - I could manage them all except the German, where I was completely lost (Non-German speakers, Ach-Tung!)

What this general mélange leads to, inevitably, is a complete lack of focus. There is no real centre or eye, in other words, in this sprawling psychodramatic storm.

There are a couple scenes which save the work from complete ruin: Basil's and Dorothy's return to their old home of "Kudjeri" is well done and quietly intense, like the best of White, and the afternoon which Mary de Santis, one of the nurses, possibly the character with which White most identified, spends with Sir Basil is so rich in imagery and minute psychological detail that, as a short story or novella, it would be overwhelming. But, herein, it's allowed to sink into the general drudgery.

So, I'm giving it a few stars for passages like these. But, taken as a whole, the book is what I would call a remarkable failure for such a gifted writer.