Effie: The Passionate Lives of Effie Gray, John Ruskin and Millais cover art

Effie: The Passionate Lives of Effie Gray, John Ruskin and Millais

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Effie: The Passionate Lives of Effie Gray, John Ruskin and Millais

By: Suzanne Fagence Cooper
Narrated by: Sophie Ward
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About this listen

Effie Gray, a Scottish beauty, was the heroine of a great Victorian love story. Married at 19 to John Ruskin, she found herself trapped in a loveless and unconsummated union. When her husband invited his protégé, John Everett Millais, away on holiday, Effie and Millais fell in love. She would inspire some of Millais' most haunting images and embody Victorian society's fears about female sexuality.

Suzanne Fagence Cooper has gained exclusive access to Effie's family letters and diaries to reveal the reality behind the scandalous love-triangle. Effie shows the rise and fall of the Pre-Raphaelite circle from a new perspective, through the eyes of a woman who was intimately involved in the private and public lives of its two greatest figures.

©2012 Suzanne Fagence Cooper (P)2014 Audible, Inc.
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I found that it lacked objectivity, biased to the point of near parody in favour of the main character. The constant use of suggestion-by-negation to condemn Effie Gray’s detractors is tiring, devolving into suggestion-as-fact by the closing chapter.
This, in combination with the florid descriptions and unintentionally ironic characterisation of Effie’s “struggles” through the years, among other things, made what could have been a very interesting perspective on the era into something resembling a Mills & Boon novel.
The narration is expertly done - consistent, well-spoken and well enunciated.

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