The Lost Language of Cranes by David Leavitt
Published 1986 · 92,400 words · about 6 hours at an average pace
How hard is The Lost Language of Cranes to read?
The Lost Language of Cranes scores 52 out of 100 for difficulty on ReadingRate, making it quite demanding. The score is a weighted composite of nine measures: four of how hard the prose is to parse, five of how hard the meaning is to extract.
- Vocabulary: 55 out of 100
- Clear, unshowy vocabulary.
- Sentence structure: 55 out of 100
- Well-made sentences of moderate length.
- Abstraction: 50 out of 100
- Concrete family life carrying a study of concealment.
- Information density: 52 out of 100
- Moderate.
- Narrative indirection: 52 out of 100
- Alternating close third persons, father and son, neither honest with themselves.
- Symbolic density: 48 out of 100
- The cranes and the apartment do quiet work.
- Ironic distance: 52 out of 100
- Distance between what each man says and what he wants.
- Resolution withholding: 55 out of 100
- The family is left unrepaired.
- Structural complexity: 52 out of 100
- Two braided strands.
How The Lost Language of Cranes is regarded
The Lost Language of Cranes holds a literary regard score of 52 out of 100, weighing its place in the canon, its critical reception, its influence on other writers, and the standing of its author. Regard is measured separately from difficulty: a demanding book is not necessarily an admired one.