DOCSLIB.ORG

A Bouquet for Sybille Bedford on the Centenary of Her Birth

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
A Bouquet for Sybille Bedford on the Centenary of Her Birth Five Dials Number 18 A Bouquet for Sybille Bedford ON the CeNteNary Of her birth featuring Roast fillet Of pOrk with fresh sOrrel melted iN cookiNg juiCes braised eNdive a salad Of peaChes aNd redCurraNts Some good Cheese a great trockeNbeereN ausleese CaberNet type Of hock . and indeed a few bites more. CONTRIBUTORS sybille bedfOrd was born on 16 March 1911, in Charlottenburg, Germany, and died in 2006 in London. In the course of a free-spirited and peripatetic life she lived in New York, Mexico, Rome, Paris and the Côte d’Azur and wrote ten books in English, all of which are classics of their kind, from her debut novel, A Legacy, to her 2005 mem- oir Quicksands, dedicated to Aliette Martin. In the words of Bruce Chatwin, ‘When the history of modern prose in English comes to be written, Sybille Bedford will have to appear in any list of its most dazzling practitioners.’ You can read more about her at www.sybillebedford.com. aliette martiN lives in Paris. She started her career by working for les Editions Plon and as an English–French translator. She entered La Comédie-Française, the first French national theatre, in 1975, where she is still working as directeur de la programmation. She met Sybille Bedford in 1992, when she translated her biography of Aldous Huxley into French. She later translated As it was and Quicksands, and is Sybille Bedford’s literary executor. Thanks: simon prOsser, juliette mitChell, Anna kelly, sarah lutyeNs, seliNa hastiNgs, CarOliNe pretty aNd matt ClaCher. Designed by deaN alleN Illustrations by riChard tOdd Subscribe: hamishhamilton.co.uk On Sybille Bedford sold, bought, not ready to drink; the wine is classified as top, highly recom- mended, recommended, borderline, Aliette Martin remembers a writer for whom poor, not recommended. The best bot- food and wine were a way of life tles she had drunk were exhibited on top of her bookshelves in Old Church I love the world – the Mediterranean, the coun- Her integrity was intrinsic in her every Street in Chelsea. tryside, friends, wine and food, architecture, art, thought and action. Her tastes were She had fun marking her wine cata- the riches of life. Why else does one write or both simple, even spartan, and sophis- logues with interrogation points, enthu- paint, except to try to hold a little of that? ticated. Cooking was an art, hospitality siastic YESes and ferocious NOs. She —Interview by Susha Guppy, sacred, sharing food the best opportuni- adored debating with wine sellers, and in Paris Review, Spring 1993 ty for developing friendship and spark- restaurants with sommeliers, who when ing off stimulating conversation. she was in her nineties often finished the es, Sybille Bedford loved life. Nov- She was fascinated by the influence evening kneeling at her feet, amazed by Yelist, biographer, essayist, journalist, of geography, soil and climate on wine the vitality, enthusiasm and knowledge she wrote often about the past, about and impressed by the craftsmanship of of this imperious and shy elderly guest. the tragic century she survived – she wine-making, by the mysterious proc- But she could be difficult too, especially died in 2006 and would have been a hun- ess of growing, maturing, resting. She with wine waiters who didn’t know how dred years old on 16 March 2011 – but relished the nuances of colour, of tastes, to pour properly. Wine for her was a seri- a deep joie de vivre is perceptible in her the richness of the vocabulary, the ous matter, part of a ritual, imbued with a descriptions of the greatest and simplest poetry of labels. sacred, almost mystical dimension. pleasures of life, love, friendship, art, With an accountant’s punctiliousness, In her account of a wine-tasting trip travel. She admired the dignity of daily she kept detailed inventories and stock in Bordelais (La Vie de Château 1978), she tasks; she delighted, as her friend Amalia certificates of her claret reserves, which describes the procedure: Elguera said, in ‘the wonder of light and she stored in the cellars of a London water’ (‘A Brief Visit to Sybille Bedford’, wine merchant. Her wine records bear We look, we chew, we think. It is a 1989). ‘Her understanding of food and coded signs meaning drawn, swopped, slow process (one is standing, if not wine,’ Amalia continued, was ‘a com- always standing still), utterly absorb- munion with earth and sea and climate, ing and near an ordeal – the raw tannin particularly the earth and sea and climate puckers the inside of the cheeks, rasps of the Mediterranean shores that are for the throat like claws, while at the ker- her the supreme instance of grace dis- nel one finds a notion of . what? tex- solved in place . .’ ture, structure, multiplicities of scents, Sybille’s interest in food and wine went analogous tastes; divine staying power, back to her childhood when her eccentric future harmonies. [. .] Lafite makes father introduced her to superb clarets, one think of a cathedral. No stainless never doubting that little girls already pos- steel here, Lafite still vinifies its wine sess a good palate. He also told her tales in those immense, plain wooden vats, about great French chefs he had known, and in the cellar a great range of barrels and taught her how to cook. She first looms in Rembrandtesque penumbra practised by trying to add flavour to the where quiet men – maturing wine dogs’ food. Later, her interest went far need silence – move about their skilled, beyond amateur practice. She would have deliberate tasks. published a cookery book, had the manu- script not been lost or stolen when she was At the beginning of 1974, about to travelling in Mexico in 1946, and she had move from the south of France to Lon- a nearly professional knowledge of wine. don, she offers to exchange wine with On Desert Island Discs, her chosen book was Gordon Taylor, an English wine buff Marcel Proust’s In Search of Lost Time, while who was settling in the south of France. her luxury was a French restaurant in full On 19 January she writes him a long working order. When asked what other letter from Les Bastides, la Roquette occupation she might have had in life, if sur Siagne, to prepare the operation. not writing, she says she wished she had She is obviously enjoying herself: been a cook, ‘or in the wine trade – mak- ing, growing and selling wine’ (interview About the great wine swop. I am en- in the Journal of the RSL, Summer 1995 ). closing a list of what is available. About In her writing as in her cooking, 18 dozen claret and a dozen and a half everything had to be true, authentic. or so of last growth sauternes. You can 3 have as much, or as little, or all this you. I’m not quite certain about exact us, can do for you before your arrival, as you choose or your drinking goes. figures of wine at Louis Le Brocqi’s, as do let me know. And also your deci- How to work it all out? I think this I’ve drawn mixed cases of these over so sions about the swop. Forgive abomi- may be rather fun. There is no need many years.) nable typing. Also haste: I’m spending for you to provide large quantities of I have been drinking the 1966 Talbot most of my time trying to get my claret in England. Nor need it be ready and Gruaud-Larose, and if I’d stayed teeth into some new work. I do hope to drink. (All my major stocks, if I can on here wd have drawn probably on for you that you will get your new call them that, of claret are in England, the 1966 Gloria this year and some of book in order before leaving. cellared at wine merchants. Most of the 1969 (after taking advice), simply I do hope we shall meet in March it is not ready to drink, but I have because one needs wine, and anything either here or in London. enough to go on.) I would be very hap- in these categories is either unob- py to have some burgundy, and equally, tainable or chiefly so astronomically For her ninetieth birthday in 2001, or perhaps more so, to get some Hock, expensive in France, far more so I find Sybille was invited to dinner by her Moselle, champagne, of which I have from the latest price lists than in Eng- neighbour, a great wine connoisseur, who none in England. All we need aim at is land. You will follow your own choice had devised an exceptional succession of some rough equivalent in quality. With and instincts, no doubt. wines: Veuve Clicquot La Grande Dame I expect a bit of give and take; there is [. .] Getting the wine to you is no 1990, Puligny Montrachet Clavoillon 1993 a lucky-dip element in wine swopping problem. If you want anything I have 1er cru, Château Pichon Lalande 1982, which rather attracts me. kept here, it can be ready for you in Château Ducru Beaucaillou 1982, Châ- The only thing I’m keen teau Ducru Beaucaillou 1989, to swop in exact kind are Chambertin Grand Cru 1985, the 1961 Ist growth Sau- Chapelle-Chambertin Grand ternes. I suppose this is easy, Cru 1990, Château Rieussec as my stock is so small. 1986 1er cru. It sounds like the Nor would I want all litany of grands crus recited as the wine at once; and this lines of poetry by Simon in A is rather essential, as I shall Favourite of the Gods (1963).
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Quicksands: a Memoir PDF Book
    QUICKSANDS: A MEMOIR PDF, EPUB, EBOOK Sybille Bedford | 384 pages | 15 May 2009 | Penguin Books Ltd | 9780140279764 | English | London, United Kingdom Quicksands: A Memoir PDF Book Trivia About Quicksands: A Memoir. To ask other readers questions about Quicksands , please sign up. Now that she's settled into the magnificence of her 90s, she has written a calm, exact, lovely book out of all that jangle of memories. Yet going over familiar ground for this book, the perspectives kept changing. Quicksands is beautifully beautifully written. This memoir is fascinating for the singular position of the narrator during the unparalleled turmoil of the early-mid C20th. Buy It Now. Her writing style is an acquired taste. In Sanary she fell in love - she dearly loves many men, but falls in love with women - and her mother, unhinged by her young husband's infidelity, became a morphine addict. Bedford's portrait of France's expat literary world in the buildup to WWII was the most interesting part of the book for me, but I found her discussion of her development as a writer quite interesting as well. Bedford was their child. Paula Fox, e. Quicksands: A Memoir by Sybille Bedford. Sybille was raised in the Roman Catholic faith of her father at Schloss Feldkirch in Baden, and had a half-sister, from her father's first marriage Maximiliane Henriette von Schoenebeck. Will try and find quote. She had a German passport and Jewish blood. My second hand book is a library book?????? When her young stepfather could take it no more, Bedford was left to handle the crooked doctors and the dockside dealers.
    [Show full text]
  • 2014 Catalogue
    Daunt Books Publishing Spring & Summer 2014 Spring & Summer 2014 ince Daunt Books began publishing in 2010, we have Sbeen devoted to reissuing brilliant yet neglected books – the sort of titles we love to see on the shelves of our own bookshops. Over the past year we’ve also begun to discover and publish original works by talented authors from around the world. All of our books are inspired by the Daunt Books shops themselves, and the exciting atmos- phere of discovery to be found in a good bookshop. For our Spring & Summer season of 2014, we are pleased to be publishing two original titles. The first is a beguiling and hilarious debut novel – The Smoke is Rising by Mahesh Rao, set in the bustling Indian city of Mysore as it inches toward the future. Mahesh is one of the freshest new voices writing today. We are also delighted to be publishing Park Notes, a beautiful anthology exploring how London’s parks continue to inspire artists and writers, curated by award-winning painter Sarah Pickstone. And there are still plenty of classic reissues this season – including the darkly hilarious Nathanael West, a thriller set in revolutionary Iran by James Buchan, and a collec- tion of stunning travel writing from the inimitable Sybille Bedford. Happy reading! 4 5 The London Scene NOW AVAILABLE Virginia Woolf AVAILABLE NOW AVAILABLE Take a stroll through London with Virginia Woolf as your guide in this beautifully illustrated book. Introduced by Hermione Lee. From the docklands of the East End to the Houses of Parlia- ment; from the bustle of Oxford Street to peaceful moments on Hampstead Heath – Virginia Woolf explores the city’s hidden places and draws a remarkable portrait of the daily lives of £10.99 Londoners.
    [Show full text]
  • The New York Review of Books
    Fintan O’Toole on the Future of Trumpism February 25, 2021 / Volume LXVIII, Number 3 Caroline Fraser: Environmental Justice in the South Brandon Terry: Malcolm X’s Transformations Clair Wills: Patricia Lockwood’s Lives Online Ben Lerner: Erica Hunt’s Language Poetry Jim Holt: Catastrophic Thinking Hermione Lee on Jan Morris Jed Perl on Max Jacob Frances Wilson on Sybille Bedford WEB_nyrb022521.indd 1 1/28/21 5:44 PM Forrest Bess Untitled #10, 1957 Oil on canvas 10 x 12 1/8 inches, 25.4 x 30.8 cm (canvas) 11 1/4 x 13 1/4 inches, 28.6 x 33.7 cm (framed) [email protected] 02_nyrb022521.indd 2 1/28/21 2:16 PM Contents 4 Fintan O’Toole The Trump Inheritance 9 Clair Wills No One Is Talking About This by Patricia Lockwood PROMISED 12 Jed Perl Max Jacob: A Life in Art and Letters by Rosanna Warren 14 Hermione Lee Thinking Again by Jan Morris 15 Paul Franz Poem LAND 16 Caroline Fraser Waste: One Woman’s Fight Against America’s Dirty Secret by Catherine Coleman Flowers, with a foreword by Bryan Stevenson 18 Ben Lerner Jump the Clock: New and Selected Poems by Erica Hunt 21 Christopher Benfey The Trials of Thomas Morton: An Anglican Lawyer, His Puritan Foes, and the Battle for a New England by Peter C. Mancall 23 Coco Fusco The Metabolic Museum by Clémentine Deliss The Brutish Museums: The Benin Bronzes, Colonial Violence and Cultural Restitution by Dan Hicks 26 Jim Holt The Precipice: Existential Risk and the Future of Humanity by Toby Ord 29 David Cole A Rush to Execute 31 Frances Wilson Sybille Bedford: A Life by Selina Hastings 33 Robert O.
    [Show full text]
  • Allanah Harper
    Allanah Harper: An Inventory of Her Papers at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center Descriptive Summary Creator Harper, Allanah, 1904-1992 Title Allanah Harper Papers Dates: 1931-1993 Extent 5 boxes (2.10 linear feet) Abstract The collection chronicles Harper's life from the 1930s through the early 1990s, primarily through Harper's outgoing and incoming correspondence, in addition to clippings, manuscripts, notebooks, and photographs. The collection also contains Sybille Bedford's correspondence, and two manuscripts relating to the work of Aldous Huxley. RLIN Record# TXRC99-A8 Languages English, German, and French. Access Open for research Administrative Information Acquisition Purchase, 1995 (Reg. No. 13364) Processed by Mary Alice Harper, 1998, Laura Gottesman, 1999 Repository: Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin Harper, Allanah, 1904-1992 Biographical Sketch Allanah Harper was born in Brighton, England on the 6th of November, 1904. Her father was a highly successful engineering contractor who served as a consultant for the design of the first Aswan Dam in Egypt, and who built the first railway through the Andes in South America. Harper grew up in a privileged household and, due to her father's work, traveled extensively as a child. Destinations included Italy, France, Spain, Egypt, South Africa, and even China where she served as bridesmaid in the wedding of one of her mother's friends. As a child she attended school at Miss Wolf's in London and Miss Douglas' at Queen's Gate, and later studied in France. Her education was also enhanced and certainly influenced by her father who had a great love of poetry.
    [Show full text]
  • The Brilliance of Sybille Bedford by Brenda Wineapple | the New York Review of Books 2/26/15, 12:03 PM
    The Brilliance of Sybille Bedford by Brenda Wineapple | The New York Review of Books 2/26/15, 12:03 PM The Brilliance of Sybille Bedford Brenda Wineapple MARCH 5, 2015 ISSUE “Survivors pay with their conscience,” Sybille Bedford observed in her memoir, Quicksands, written in 2005, toward the end of her very long life. Born in 1911 outside of Berlin in Charlottenburg, Germany, she died in London in 2006, just a month before she would have turned ninety-five. She’d endured two world wars and the heedlessness preceding each of them as well as the Holocaust, though from afar, and the painful, impossible, and sometimes exhilarating reconstruction of several cultures: she understood firsthand the burdens of survival. Perhaps as a result she developed her remarkable talent for making the inchoate circumstances we retrospectively understand as “historical forces” seem real, palpable, human. So too “the small things men do to each other every day if they have the power and the lack of imagination, or if their convictions happen to run that way,” as she once noted. “It goes unrecorded, it is hardly voiced, but it lives in the memories of those concerned.” A Legacy, her finest novel, and superb by any standard, is partly about memory, both personal and cultural.* “We are said to re-invent our memories; we often re-arrange them,” comments its narrator, a woman born shortly before the advent of World War Terry Smith/Camera Press/Redux I (like Bedford) who pieces together her peculiar inheritance from the rumors, Sybille Bedford, 1989 innuendoes, and snatches of conversation she heard as a child: the tale of a long-ago family scandal that once almost toppled the German government.
    [Show full text]
  • Donna Rifkind's
    Five Best: Donna Rifkind on Hitler’s Exiles in America From the author, most recently, of The Sun and Her Stars: Salka Viertel and Hitler’s Exiles in the Golden Age of Hollywood Lion Feuchtwanger in 1951 PHOTO: BETTMANN/GETTY IMAGES By Donna Rifkind Feb. 14, 2020 10:47 am ET Prater Violet by Christopher Isherwood (1945) ① “There are meetings which are like recognitions—this was one of them.” In this brief novel, Christopher Isherwood memorialized his first encounter with the exiled Viennese poet and director Berthold Viertel. “I knew that face,” Isherwood recalled. “It was the face of a political situation, an epoch. The face of central Europe.” Set in the London film community of the 1930s, then teeming with refugees, the book captures Viertel, here called Friedrich Bergmann, in all his mercurial splendor. He charms the young Isherwood into serving as the writer for his latest picture, then spends manic workdays recalling past theatrical triumphs. When Bergmann fears for his family, trapped in Vienna under martial law, Isherwood dares to offer advice. Bergmann admonishes him: “Your home has never been threatened. You cannot know what it is like to be an exile, a perpetual stranger. I am bitterly ashamed that I am here, in safety.” The friendship between the two men was close and enduring, and both became American citizens; at one point Isherwood occupied the garage apartment of Viertel’s Santa Monica home. “He was my father,” Isherwood wrote. “I was his son. And I loved him very much.” The Oppermanns by Lion Feuchtwanger (1933) ② The author, a German Jew, was in the United States on a speaking tour when Adolf Hitler became chancellor of Germany in 1933.
    [Show full text]
  • Jigsaw: an Unsentimental Education Free
    FREE JIGSAW: AN UNSENTIMENTAL EDUCATION PDF Sybille Bedford | 368 pages | 21 Jul 2009 | Eland Publishing Ltd | 9780907871798 | English | London, United Kingdom Editions of Jigsaw: An Unsentimental Education by Sybille Bedford Goodreads helps you keep track of books you want to read. Want to Read saving…. Want to Read Currently Reading Read. Other editions. Enlarge cover. Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Open Preview See a Problem? Details if other :. Jigsaw: An Unsentimental Education for telling us about the problem. Return to Book Page. Preview — Jigsaw by Sybille Bedford. Shortlisted for the Booker Prize, Sybille Bedford's latest novel walks the borderline between autobiography and fiction. It picks up where A Legacy leaves off, leading us from the Kaiser's Germany into the wider Europe of the s and the limbo between world wars. The narrator, Billi, tells the story of her apprenticeship to life, and of her many teachers: her father, a p Shortlisted for the Booker Prize, Sybille Bedford's latest novel walks the borderline between autobiography and fiction. The narrator, Billi, tells the story of her apprenticeship to life, and of her many teachers: her father, a pleasure-loving German baron; her brilliant, beautiful, erratic English mother; and later, on the Mediterranean coast of France, the Huxleys, Aldous and Maria. Get A Copy. Paperbackpages. More Details Original Title. Booker Prize Nominee Other Editions Friend Reviews. To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up. To ask other readers questions about Jigsawplease sign up. Lists with This Book. Community Reviews. Showing Average rating 4. Rating details.
    [Show full text]
  • The New Criterion – February 2021
    February 2021 A monthly review edited by Roger Kimball Notes & Comments, 1 Saint Ted of the Senate by James Piereson, 4 Sybille Bedford at the feast by D. J. Taylor, 10 Calhoun: American heretic by Allen C. Guelzo, 15 Solzhenitsyn & history by Robert D. Kaplan, 21 New poems by Anton Yakovlev, Rachel Hadas & Jessica Hornik, 26 Reflections by James Zug & Edward Greenwood, 29; Reconsiderations by David Platzer, 35; Theater by Kyle Smith, 38; Art by Karen Wilkin & James Panero, 42; Music by Jay Nordlinger, 49; The media by James Bowman, 53 Books: Richard Bradford Devils, lusts & strange desires reviewed by Brooke Allen, 57; Alexander Rose Empires of the sky reviewed by John Steele Gordon, 60; Robert Tombs This sovereign isle reviewed by Simon Heffer, 63; Iris Jamahl Dunkle Charmian Kittredge London reviewed by Carl Rollyson, 66; Jan 02 Swafford Mozart reviewed by John Check, 67; Judith Flanders A place for 74820 64692 February everything reviewed by Anthony Daniels, 69; Paul Betts Ruin & renewal reviewed by Daniel Johnson, 71; Notebook by Charles Cronin & Eric Gibson, 75 Volume 39, Number 6, $7.75 / £7.50 / c$9.75 02 > The New Criterion February 2021 Editor & Publisher Roger Kimball Executive Editor James Panero Managing Editor Benjamin Riley Associate Editor Andrew L. Shea Poetry Editor Adam Kirsch Visiting Critic Myron Magnet Hilton Kramer Fellow Isaac Sligh Office Manager Caetlynn Booth Assistant to the Editors Jayne Allison Editorial Interns Ariana Gravinese & Yulia Pyankova Founding Editor Hilton Kramer Founding Publisher Samuel Lipman Contributors to this issue Brooke Allen writes frequently for The New Simon Heffer’s The Age of Decadence will be Criterion and other publications.
    [Show full text]
  • 2019 Catalogue
    4 FRONTLIST Daunt Books Publishing 2019 Letter from the Publishers As always, our books take us on a journey. This year, the writers on our list explore how where we are impacts who we are, and the stories we have to tell. Natalia Ginzburg’s slender, enduring novels Voices in the Evening and Happiness, As Such paint a picture of life in Italy after the Second World War and in the 1970s respectively, through characters tied to home, or eager to leave it. Often, uproot- ing yourself can offer a unique perspective. InThe Solace of Open Spaces, Gretel Ehrlich finds comfort in the harsh, majestic landscape of Wyoming and its taci- turn but tender locals; settling in Aix-en-Provence with her two young daughters, M.F.K Fisher surveys a changed France in Map of Another Town. The stories in Tatyana Tolstaya’s Aetherial Worlds move from recognisable loca- tions – Soviet Russia, America, France, Crete and Italy – to fantastical ones with dazzling imaginative force. Closer to home, the contributors to At the Pond reflect on Hampstead Heath’s Ladies’ Pond, a place immortalised within literature and uniquely timeless. Meanwhile, in Faces, Vita Sackville-West profiles the globetrot- ting journeys and distinctive characteristics of some very different dogs. Happy reading! Contents 4 Voices in the Evening Natalia Ginzburg 5 The Solace of Open Spaces Gretel Ehrlich 6 Aetherial Worlds Tatyana Tolstaya 7 Map of Another Town M.F.K. Fisher 8-9 At the Pond: Writing on the Hampstead Ladies’ Pond 10 Happiness, As Such Natalia Ginzburg 11 Faces: Profiles of Dogs Vita Sackville-West 12 Cassandra at the Wedding Dorothy Baker 13 Ants Among Elephants Sujatha Gidla 14 Consider the Oyster M.F.K.
    [Show full text]
  • Quicksands: a Memoir, 2006, 384 Pages, Sybille Bedford, 0141911883, 9780141911885, Penguin UK, 2006
    Quicksands: A Memoir, 2006, 384 pages, Sybille Bedford, 0141911883, 9780141911885, Penguin UK, 2006 DOWNLOAD http://bit.ly/1umRUB9 http://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&query=Quicksands%3A+A+Memoir Beginning in 1956 with the publication of A Legacy, Sybille Bedford has narrated - in fiction and non-fiction - what has been by turns her sensuous, harrowing, altogether remarkable life. In this magnificent memoir, she moves from Berlin during the Great War to the artists' set on the Côte d'Azur of the 1920s, through lovers, mentors, seducers and friends, and from genteel yet shabby poverty to relative comfort in London's Chelsea. Whether evoking the simple sumptuousness of a home-cooked meal or tracing the heart-rending outline of an intimate betrayal, she offers spellbinding reflections on how history imprints itself on private lives. DOWNLOAD http://goo.gl/RQQeb http://scribd.com/doc/29438265/Quicksands-A-Memoir http://bit.ly/1lytqAJ Quicksands Webster’s Quotations, Facts and Phrases, Icon Group International, , , . We Were in Auschwitz , Janusz Nel Siedlecki, Oct 1, 2000, Biography & Autobiography, 195 pages. Written in 1945 by three young Polish former inmates of Auschwitz, " We Were in Auschwitz" was one of the very first books ever written about the horrors of the Nazi. Hail and Farewell Ave, Salve, Vale, George Moore, 1947, , 774 pages. Casual change , Alan Houghton Brodrick, Mar 1, 1974, Biography & Autobiography, 224 pages. The Faces of Justice , Sybille Bedford, Sep 15, 2011, History, 256 pages. 'Going to law courts is a good education for a novelist. It provides you with the most extravagant material, and it teaches the near impossibility of reaching the truth.
    [Show full text]
  • Evelyn Waugh Newsletter and Stud
    EVELYN WAUGH NEWSLETTER AND STUD EVELYN WAUGH NEWSLETTER AND STUDIES Vol. 37, No. 1 Spring 2006 Something So Different by Kathryn S. Easter The literary gamut usually runs from the sublime to the ridiculous, but Evelyn Waugh developed in quite the reverse direction: from the ridiculous to the sublime. Between his first novel and his last, Waugh clearly went through a profound paradigm shift easily detected in his themes. The startling change recalls Monty Python’s stock transitional phrase, “and now for something completely different.” Waugh’s view of the world was completely different by the time he wrote his masterpiece, Brideshead Revisited, for a singular reason: he had become a Roman Catholic. Waugh wrote in Decline and Fall, his first novel, that it “is meant to be funny” (Stannard 81), and it certainly is. The absurdity of characters and the outrageousness of situations make for a terrific laugh-out-loud read. The main character, Paul Pennyfeather, finds himself in a world of materialism, hypocrisy, treachery, and degeneracy, all given as dominant features of contemporary life. Waugh presents this world with macabre and even grotesque hilarity. At the same time, he anticipates Northrop Frye’s description of comedy: “Comedy is designed not to condemn evil, but to ridicule a lack of self-knowledge” (Frye 81). This is what Waugh does so well in his first novel. His characters are mean, selfish, and corrupt, but they are not evil—only ignorant. They do not see themselves for who they truly are, and their blindness makes them tragic but at the same time hilarious.
    [Show full text]
  • Manuskript: Die Noble Nomadin
    1 COPYRIGHT COPYRIGHT: Dieses Manuskript ist urheberrechtlich geschützt. Es darf ohne Genehmigung nicht verwertetDieses Manuskriptwerden. Insbesondere ist urheberrechtlich darf es nicht geschützt. ganz oEders darf teilweise ohne Genehmigung oder in Auszügen nicht abgeschriebenverwertet werden. oder in Insbesondere sonstiger Weise darf esvervielfältig nicht ganzt werden.oder teilweise Für Rundfunkzwecke oder in Auszügen darf dasabgeschrieben Manuskript nur oder mit in Genehmigung sonstiger Weise von vervielfältig DeutschlandRt werden.adio /Für Funkhaus Rundfunkzwecke Berlin benutzt werden.darf das Manuskript nur mit Genehmigung von Deutschlandradio Kultur benutzt werden. Edelgard Abenstein Die noble Nomadin Sybille Bedfords literarische Erinnerungen an ein vergangenes Europa Musik Sprecherin 1 „ ‚Wie war es, Ihr jüngeres Ich?‘ – ‚Jung‘. – ‚Das ist kein Verbrechen.‘ – ‚Ach, ich weiß nicht.‘ – Flavia nahm einen Briefbeschwerer, legte ihn hin, hob die Hand. – ‚Man macht komische Sachen. Wissen Sie, wenn man jung ist, fühlt man sich noch nicht zugehörig, als Teil der Menschheit; man tut Dinge, die noch nicht endgültig sind. Alles ist wie eine Probe, die man nach Belieben wiederholen kann. In der man etwas korrigieren kann, bis es ernst wird und der Vorhang aufgeht. Doch eines Tages merkt man, dass der Vorhang die ganze Zeit auf war. Dass es die Aufführung war.‘“ Sprecherin 2 „Ein trügerischer Sommer“ heißt der Roman, in dem eine 50-jährige Schriftstellerin auf ihr Leben als Siebzehnjährige zurückblickt. Als sie ihn 1968 veröffentlichte, war Sybille Bedford Ende 50. Sie, die zu Beginn des vergangenen Jahrhunderts geboren wurde und zu Beginn des neuen Jahrhunderts, vor wenigen Monaten, gestorben ist, hat sich eine 2 »Davongekommene« genannt. Glaubt man diesem Buch von ihr und allen anderen, so hat sie, die wir für ihre Weltläufigkeit bewundern, denn sie ist weit herumgekommen, vielleicht am intensivsten in jenen Jahren gelebt, die sie „Entre-Les-Guerres“, „Zwischen den Kriegen“ nennt.
    [Show full text]