The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone

By: Tennessee Williams

Narrated by: Shirley Knight

The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone is vintage Tennessee Williams. It is the story of a 50-ish wealthy American widow who was most recently a famous stage beauty but is now drifting after the death of her husband. With poignant wit and his own particular brand of relish, Williams charts her drift into an affair with a cruel young gigolo.©1950 The University of the South (P)2009 Audio Holdings, LLC

Critic reviews

"Splendid characterization." ( Library Journal)

La Dolce Vita

I listened to this while I was in Rome. The restaurants mentioned in book still exist, but today seem to be living off their glorious former days. Tennessee at his best, gothic, over the top, truthful and honest. The narrator Shirley Knight - of the same era as Tennessee. A time capsule - so much to be explored about it.

Classic Tennessee Williams

Having just recently watched the movie with Helen Mirren as Mrs. Stone, it dawned on me I should actually read some works by the author, rather than just watch movie renditions.

So cheated “read’ with “listen” and, as luck would have it, this was the only of his books I found on Audible.

Still going backwards, the movie was quite faithful to the book, with the exceptions not affecting the story at all.

Mr. Williams has a wonderfully insightful way of presenting all the contextual how’s, why’s and wherefores of a situation before zooming in on The. Point., often presenting deadpan humor in all seriousness.

Embedded in his technique is (here) the tale of a woman of a certain age and independent means struggling to rebuild a significant life after the pillars of significance in her now-former life had fallen.

Not an easy task in post-war Rome, trying to navigate the gold diggers of several ages and fallen - as well as contrived - social classes.

Though the story holds up well all these decades later, the raciness of it has lost its piquancy compared to what 2022 culture is casually exposed to.