Elizabeth Jane Howard: a Dangerous Innocence Free

Total Page:16

File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb

Elizabeth Jane Howard: a Dangerous Innocence Free FREE ELIZABETH JANE HOWARD: A DANGEROUS INNOCENCE PDF Artemis Cooper | 384 pages | 22 Sep 2016 | Hodder & Stoughton General Division | 9781848549272 | English | London, United Kingdom Elizabeth Jane Howard: A Dangerous Innocence by Artemis Cooper – review | Books | The Guardian Elizabeth Jane Howard wrote brilliant novels about what love can do to people, but in her own life the lasting relationship she sought so ardently always eluded her. She grew up yearning to be an actress; but when that ambition was thwarted by marriage and the war, she turned to fiction. Her first novel, The Beautiful Visit, won the John Elizabeth Jane Howard: A Dangerous Innocence Rhys prize - she went on to write fourteen more, of which the best-loved were the five volumes of The Cazalet Chronicle. Following her divorce from her first husband, the celebrated naturalist Peter Scott, Jane embarked on a string of high-profile affairs with Cecil Day-Lewis, Arthur Koestler and Laurie Lee, which turned her into a literary femme fatale. Yet the image of a sophisticated woman hid a romantic innocence which clouded her emotional judgement. She was nearing the end of a disastrous second marriage when she met Kingsley Amis, and for a few years they were a brilliant and glamorous couple - until that marriage too disintegrated. She settled in Suffolk where she wrote and entertained friends, but her turbulent love life was not over yet. In her early seventies Jane fell for a conman. His unmasking was the final disillusion, and inspired one of her most powerful novels, Falling. Artemis Cooper interviewed Jane several times in Suffolk. She also talked extensively to her family, friends and contemporaries, and had access to all her papers. Her biography explores a woman trying to make sense of her life through Elizabeth Jane Howard: A Dangerous Innocence writing, as well as illuminating the literary world in which she lived. Post liberation Paris — an epoch charged with political and conflicting emotions. Liberation was greeted with joy but marked by recriminations and the trauma of purges. The feverish intellectual arguments of Elizabeth Jane Howard: A Dangerous Innocence young took place amidst the mundane reality of hunger and fuel shortages. This is a stunning historical account of one of the most stimulating periods in twentieth century French history. Surrounded by Elizabeth Jane Howard: A Dangerous Innocence in a town ultimately threatened with military invasion ina group of friends deals with the arrival of Maggie Dunlop, a troubled Scottish girl who unknowingly causes feelings of unrest and jealousy. From the bestselling author of The Cazalet Chronicles, The Sea Change is a witty yet heart-rending story of a marriage in crisis. Emmanuel is a famous playwright. Lillian is his sickly and embittered wife. They have never fully buried the memory of their dead daughter, Sarah. Rich but discontented, they flit from capital to capital in the company of their hero-worshipping young manager. Then Alberta, straight from an English vicarage and the pages of Jane Austen, is appointed as Emmanuel's secretary. This prim Elizabeth Jane Howard: A Dangerous Innocence utterly delightful figure helps the family in Elizabeth Jane Howard: A Dangerous Innocence they didn't know they needed. One by one the leopards change their spots. Bestselling author and acclaimed historian Alison Weir tells the tragic story of Henry VIII's fifth wife, a nineteen-year-old beauty with a hidden past, in this fifth novel in the sweeping Six Tudor Queens series. Although the king is now an ailing forty- nine-year-old measuring fifty-four inches around his waist, his amorous gaze lights upon the pretty teenager. Seated near him intentionally by her ambitious Catholic family, Katheryn readily succumbs to the courtship. Henry is besotted with his bride. He tells the Elizabeth Jane Howard: A Dangerous Innocence she is a rose without a thorn, and extols her beauty and her virtue. Katherine delights in the pleasures of being queen and the power she has to do good to others. She comes to love the ailing, obese king and tolerate his nightly attentions. If she can bear him a son, her triumph will be complete. But Katheryn has a past of which Henry knows nothing, and which comes back increasingly to haunt her--even as she courts danger yet again. The leading expert on video sales and rentals presents the ultimate video sourcebook--the most complete and comprehensive one on the market, with over 22, entries of every film available on video in an easy-to-use A-Z format, cross-indexed by title, director, celebrity and film category, including a special section listing films suitable for children. The respected expert in video sales and rentals offers an extensive reference guide of every film available on video--from new releases, classics and golden oldies to made-for-TV and foreign films. More than 20, entries, cross-indexed by title, director, celebrity, category, and more. With over new entries added since the edition, this ultimate video guidebook for all video viewers gives a clear plot summary of each film, an MPAA rating, and extensive indices. From new releases to classics, foreign films to children's viewing, this reference contains over 20, entries of films available on video. Bestselling author and acclaimed historian Alison Weir brings her Tudor Queens series to a close with the remarkable story of Henry VIII's sixth and final wife, who manages to survive him and remarry, only to be thrown into a romantic intrigue that threatens the very throne of England. Having sent his much-beloved but deceitful young wife Katheryn Howard to her beheading, King Henry fixes his lonely eyes on a more mature woman, thirty-year-old, twice-widowed Katharine Parr. Aware of his rival, Henry sends him abroad, leaving Katharine no choice but to become Henry's sixth queen in The king is no longer in any condition to father a child, but Katharine is content to mother his three children, Mary, Elizabeth, and the longed-for male heir, Edward. Four years into the marriage, Henry dies, leaving England's throne to nine-year-old Edward--a puppet in the hands of ruthlessly ambitious royal courtiers--and Katharine's life takes a more complicated turn. Thrilled at this renewed opportunity to wed her first love, Katharine doesn't realize that Sir Thomas now sees her as a mere stepping stone to the throne, his eye actually set on bedding and wedding fourteen-year-old Elizabeth. The princess is innocently flattered by his attentions, allowing him into her bedroom, to the shock of her household. The result is a tangled tale of love and a struggle for power, bringing to a close the dramatic and violent reign of Henry VIII. Page: View: Elizabeth Jane Howard: A Dangerous Innocence by Artemis Cooper Cookies are used to provide, analyse and improve our services; provide chat tools; and show you relevant content on advertising. You can learn more about our use of cookies here. Are you happy to accept all Elizabeth Jane Howard: A Dangerous Innocence Accept all Manage Cookies Cookie Preferences We use cookies and similar tools, including those used by approved third parties collectively, "cookies" for the purposes described below. You can learn more about how we plus approved third parties use cookies and how to change your settings by visiting the Cookies notice. The choices you make here will apply to your interaction with this service on this device. Essential We use cookies to provide our servicesfor example, to keep track of items stored in your shopping basket, prevent fraudulent activity, improve the security of our services, keep track of your specific preferences e. These cookies are necessary to provide our site and services and therefore cannot be disabled. For example, we use cookies to conduct research and diagnostics to improve our content, products and services, and to measure and analyse the performance of our services. Show less Show more Advertising ON OFF We use cookies to serve you certain types of adsincluding ads relevant to your interests on Book Depository and to work with approved third parties in the process of delivering ad content, including Elizabeth Jane Howard: A Dangerous Innocence relevant to your interests, to measure the effectiveness of their ads, and to perform services on behalf of Book Depository. Dispatched from the UK in 1 business day When will my order arrive? We use cookies to improve this site Cookies are used to provide, analyse and improve our services; provide chat tools; and show you relevant content on advertising. Accept all Manage Cookies. Cookie Preferences We use cookies and similar tools, including those used by approved third parties collectively, "cookies" for the purposes described below. We use cookies to provide our servicesfor example, to keep track of items stored in your shopping basket, prevent fraudulent activity, improve the security of our services, keep track of your specific preferences e. Performance and Analytics. ON OFF. We use cookies to serve you certain types of adsincluding ads relevant to your interests on Book Depository and to work with approved third parties in the process of delivering ad content, including ads relevant to your interests, to measure the effectiveness of their ads, and to perform services on behalf of Book Depository. Cancel Save settings. Home Contact us Help Free delivery worldwide. Free delivery worldwide. Bestselling Series. Harry Potter. Popular Features. Home Learning. Description Elizabeth Jane Howard: A Dangerous Innocence Jane Howard wrote brilliant novels about what love can do to people, but in her own life the lasting relationship she sought so ardently always eluded her. She grew up yearning to be an actress; but when that ambition was thwarted by marriage and the war, she turned to fiction.
Recommended publications
  • Il Suo Legame Con Lo Scrittore Kingsley Amis Ha Fatto Storia Nella Swinging
    FAMEstoria di donna DAMORE Il suo legame’ con lo scrittore Kingsley Amis ha fatto storia nella Swinging London. Elizabeth Jane Howard - una vita da seduttrice sfortunata - aveva la scrittura nel sangue. Il suo talento è esploso in tarda età, lontano dagli uomini... di STEFANIA BONACINA ALTA, LONGILINEA E CON UNA CASCATA di capelli biondi. La prima impres- sione che registrano gli occhi adolescenti di Martin Amis posandosi su Elizabeth Jane Howard, l’amante del padre, è quella di una dea in sottoveste che si reca in cucina per preparare a lui e ai suoi fratelli uova e pancetta. La scena si svolge nel 1962 nell’appartamento di Kingsley Amis, mattatore della scena letteraria. I due amanti si sono incontrati poche settimane prima al Festival letterario di Cheltenham, di cui lei era diret- trice artistica e lui oratore sul tema “sesso e censura”; un’attrazione così fatale da porre fine in pochi mesi ai rispettivi matrimoni. Questo incontro segnerà per l’au- trice best seller de La Saga dei Cazalet l’inizio di una nuova vita alla soglia dei 40 anni – «Ho riso con un uomo per la prima volta», dichiarerà in un’intervista – ma non sarà questa la fine della sua travagliata vita sentimentale. L’AMORE “MALATO” DEL PADRE Nata a Londra nel 1923 in una famiglia tanto al- to borghese quanto disfunzionale, Elizabeth sconterà tutta la vita una fame d’amore condita dalla mancanza di autostima accumulata durante l’infanzia. Il padre, David, svogliato erede di un impero di commercio di legnami ed eroe di guerra, la ama un po’ troppo al punto da “stringerle i seni e baciarla” durante l’adolescenza.
    [Show full text]
  • HUK+Adult+FW1920+Catalogue+-+
    Saving You By (author) Charlotte Nash Sep 17, 2019 | Paperback $24.99 | Three escaped pensioners. One single mother. A road trip to rescue her son. The new emotionally compelling page-turner by Australia's Charlotte Nash In their tiny pale green cottage under the trees, Mallory Cook and her five-year- old son, Harry, are a little family unit who weather the storms of life together. Money is tight after Harry's father, Duncan, abandoned them to expand his business in New York. So when Duncan fails to return Harry after a visit, Mallory boards a plane to bring her son home any way she can. During the journey, a chance encounter with three retirees on the run from their care home leads Mallory on an unlikely group road trip across the United States. 9780733636479 Zadie, Ernie and Jock each have their own reasons for making the journey and English along the way the four of them will learn the lengths they will travel to save each other - and themselves. 384 pages Saving You is the beautiful, emotionally compelling page-turner by Charlotte Nash, bestselling Australian author of The Horseman and The Paris Wedding. Subject If you love the stories of Jojo Moyes and Fiona McCallum you will devour this FICTION / Family Life / General book. 'I was enthralled... Nash's skilled storytelling will keep you turning pages until Distributor the very end.' FLEUR McDONALD Hachette Book Group Contributor Bio Charlotte Nash is the bestselling author of six novels, including four set in country Australia, and The Paris Wedding, which has been sold in eight countries and translated into multiple languages.
    [Show full text]
  • 5 July 2013 Page 1 of 17 SATURDAY 29 JUNE 2013 Thinking 'Is That It?', and Stayed in India for a Further 18 Months
    Radio 4 Listings for 29 June – 5 July 2013 Page 1 of 17 SATURDAY 29 JUNE 2013 thinking 'is that it?', and stayed in India for a further 18 months. how we make it. Today 100 hours of video are uploaded onto YouTube every minute... six billion hours of video are watched SAT 00:00 Midnight News (b02ypklq) On this walk, around Cannock Chase in Staffordshire, Tara is every month. And by the time you finish reading this The latest national and international news from BBC Radio 4. accompanied by his son, Clive, Clive's wife, Jodie, and their description, those figures may already be out of date. Followed by Weather. two children. The BBC Arts Editor, Will Gompertz, in searching for the next Producer: Karen Gregor. generation of cultural Zeitgeisters, meets the people who are SAT 00:30 Book of the Week (b02ymgwl) moving YouTube up to the next level: 'YouTubers' like David Mitchell - The Reason I Jump Benjamin Cook, who posts regular episodes of 'Becoming SAT 06:30 Farming Today (b0366wml) YouTube' on his channel Nine Brass Monkeys; Andy Taylor, Episode 5 Farming Today This Week who's 'Little Dot Studios' aims to bridge the gap between television and YouTube; and Ben McOwen Wilson who is By Naoki Higashida A third of people living in rural areas face poverty, despite the Director of Content Partnerships for YouTube in Europe. Translated by David Mitchell and KA Yoshida, and introduced fact that most of them are in work. by David Mitchell And that's not all that's worrying. People in their thirties are Producer: Paul Kobrak.
    [Show full text]
  • The Beauty and the Psycho - Times Online
    The beauty and the psycho - Times Online Don't miss a beat Claim Your Free Sunday Times Sports Calendar If you want to feed yourself, don’t try to feed strangers AA Gill Send your views News Comment Business Money Sport Life & Style Travel Driving Arts & Ents Video Archive Our Papers Film Music Stage Visual Arts TV & Radio What's On Books The TLS Games & Puzzles MYWhere PROFILE am I?SHOPHome JOBS PROPERTYArts & Entertainment CLASSIFIEDS Books From The Sunday TimesOctober 12, 2008 MOST READ The beauty and the psycho MOST COMMENTED MOST CURIOUS The acclaimed novelist Elizabeth Jane Howard tells of her seduction by a conman Today she now suspects of murder ● Don’t take health tips from celebs if... ● 2009: the year in view Explore Books ● Stampede for sales as shops fear the worst ● Book Extracts ● How Sahar Daftary's death fall exposed... ● Book Reviews ● Books Group ● Audio Books Times Recommends ● The Times Christmas Books Rosie Millard 2008: Books of the year ● If you only buy one book this THIS ARTICLE IS THE SUBJECT OF A LEGAL COMPLAINT Christmas make sure it's... ● Although she is now referred to as a “classic British author”, Elizabeth Some of it was fun: Working with Jane Howard feels she has only recently become an adult. “Adolescence RFK and LBJ by Nicholas is not a finite state,” she explains. “Plenty of people are in their fifties and Katzenbach are still adolescents. I feel grown-up now.” She pauses. “But it’s taken a bloody long time.” Best of 2008 Well, at least she’s had an interesting adolescence.
    [Show full text]
  • Elizabeth Jane Howard Papers, the Huntington Library, San Marino, CA Indexing: Subjects (Pages 1-41) and Added Entries (Pages 42-48)
    Elizabeth Jane Howard Papers, The Huntington Library, San Marino, CA Indexing: Subjects (pages 1-41) and Added Entries (pages 42-48) Indexing: Subjects -- Parts I, II, III & IV Age UK Suffolk. In Aldeburgh Bookshop (Suffolk, England), letter to Elizabeth Jane Howard, (2013, Nov. 29). EJH 4256. Aickman, Robert. In David Bolton, 1931-, essay, ([2001]). EJH 4174. Aickman, Robert. In David Bolton, 1931-, letter to Elizabeth Jane Howard, (2000, Nov. 20). EJH 4328. Aickman, Robert. In Elizabeth Jane Howard, letter to Jean Mallows, ([2004, Aug.]). EJH 4630. Aickman, Robert. In Elizabeth Jane Howard, letter to Anthea Sutherland, (1951, Jan. 30). EJH 3528. Aickman, Robert. In Jean Mallows, letters to Elizabeth Jane Howard, (2004). EJH 4795-4796. Aickman, Robert. "Larger Than Oneself." In Robert Newton Linscott, letter to Miss Gregorson, (1951, May 1). EJH 1221. Aickman, Robert. We Are For The Dark. In Robert Newton Linscott, letter to Miss Gregorson, (1951, May 1). EJH 1221. Aickman, Robert. In Michael Jarrett Walsh, letter to Elizabeth Jane Howard, (2001, Mar. 12). EJH 5073. Aldiss, Brian Wilson. In Andrew Brown, 1955-, letter to Elizabeth Jane Howard, (2001, Apr. 27). EJH 4339. Amis, Kingsley. In Hilly Amis, 1928?-, postcard to Linda McAndrew, (1959, Sep. 2). EJH 4261. Amis, Kingsley. In Richard Bradford, 1957-, letter to Elizabeth Jane Howard, (1998, Feb. 12). EJH 4336. Amis, Kingsley. In Betty Harper Fussell, letter to Elizabeth Jane Howard, (1983, Sept. 4). EJH 720. Amis, Kingsley. In Betty Harper Fussell, letter to Elizabeth Jane Howard, (1986, Dec. 8). EJH 2687. Amis, Kingsley. In Elizabeth Jane Howard, card to Richard Temple-Muir, (1979, Mar.
    [Show full text]
  • Read Ebook {PDF EPUB} Getting It Right by Elizabeth Howard Getting It Right by Elizabeth Howard
    Read Ebook {PDF EPUB} Getting It Right by Elizabeth Howard Getting It Right by Elizabeth Howard. Completing the CAPTCHA proves you are a human and gives you temporary access to the web property. What can I do to prevent this in the future? If you are on a personal connection, like at home, you can run an anti-virus scan on your device to make sure it is not infected with malware. If you are at an office or shared network, you can ask the network administrator to run a scan across the network looking for misconfigured or infected devices. Another way to prevent getting this page in the future is to use Privacy Pass. You may need to download version 2.0 now from the Chrome Web Store. Cloudflare Ray ID: 6610a33178a82ba1 • Your IP : 116.202.236.252 • Performance & security by Cloudflare. Getting It Right by Elizabeth Howard. Completing the CAPTCHA proves you are a human and gives you temporary access to the web property. What can I do to prevent this in the future? If you are on a personal connection, like at home, you can run an anti-virus scan on your device to make sure it is not infected with malware. If you are at an office or shared network, you can ask the network administrator to run a scan across the network looking for misconfigured or infected devices. Another way to prevent getting this page in the future is to use Privacy Pass. You may need to download version 2.0 now from the Chrome Web Store.
    [Show full text]
  • Consciousness and the Novel 2
    Contents Cover About the Book Also by David Lodge Dedication Title Page Preface 1. Consciousness and the Novel 2. Literary Criticism and Literary Creation 3. Dickens Our Contemporary 4. Forster’s Flawed Masterpiece 5. Waugh’s Comic Wasteland 6. Lives in Letters: Kingsley and Martin Amis 7. Henry James and the Movies 8. Bye-Bye Bech? 9. Sick with Desire: Philip Roth’s Libertine Professor 10. Kierkegaard for Special Purposes 11. A Conversation about Thinks . Notes Index Copyright About the Book Human consciousness, long the province of literature, has lately come in for a remapping – even rediscovery – by the natural sciences, driven by developments in Artificial Intelligence, neuroscience, and evolutionary biology. But as the richest record we have of human consciousness, literature, David Lodge suggests, may offer a kind of knowledge about this phenomenon that is complementary, not opposed, to scientific knowledge. Writing with characteristic wit and brio, and employing the insight and acumen of a skilled novelist and critic, Lodge here explores the representation of human consciousness in fiction (mainly English and American) in the light of recent investigations in cognitive science, neuroscience, and related disciplines. How, Lodge asks, does the novel represent consciousness? And how has this changed over time? In a series of interconnected essays, he pursues this question down various paths: how does the novel's method compare with that of other creative media such as film? How does the consciousness (and unconscious) of the creative writer do its work? And how can criticism infer the nature of this process through formal analysis? In essays on Charles Dickens, E.M.
    [Show full text]
  • 00 Amis Prelims.Qxd
    1 Life and contexts The early years, 1949–73 Martin Amis was born on 25 August 1949. Looking back he reflects, “four days later, the Russians successfully tested their first atom bomb, [. .] the world had taken a turn for the worse” (EM 1). As he grew up, Amis came to see himself as representative of a generation that had inherited a world radically different from that in which his father, Kingsley Amis, had lived, one threatened by nuclear anni- hilation. He concluded that his father’s generation “got it hugely wrong,” and that, in consequence, his own generation faced a drastically deteriorated stage of modernity, “trapped in the great mistake” (EM 13). Frequently Amis depicts his father’s generation as the last inhabitants of an Edenic state that they had been responsible for losing: “Post-1945 life is completely different from everything that came before it. We are like no other people in history” (McGrath 1987: 194). So much of Martin Amis’s outlook and work has been formed in reaction to the beliefs and writing of his father, Kingsley (see Criticism, p. 86). Martin has called his relationship to his father “a very enjoyable adversarial” one, “argumentative, but close” (Ross 1987: 24). When he came to write his memoir, Experience, as he was turning fifty, he significantly chose to organize the material of his own life in parallel to that of his father. The “Envoy” concludes: “I am you and you are me” (E 364). But the ways in which he fights off his father as much as he identifies with him are complex and contribute to the originality of the son’s fictional writing.
    [Show full text]
  • Martin Amis's "Money" and "Time's Arrow"
    MARTIN AMIS'S "MONEY" AND "TIME'S ARROW" http://www.csulb.edu/~bhfinney/Amis1.html WHAT'S AMIS IN CONTEMPORARY BRITISH FICTION? MARTIN AMIS'S MONEY AND TIME'S ARROW 1 The son of Kingsley Amis, a writer who began his literary life - with John Osborne and John Wain - as one of the Angry Young Men, Martin Amis outstripped his father's reputation for offending the literary niceties of his day with his first novel, The Rachel Papers (1973). Amis was twenty four when the book appeared to admiring reviews. Many of the features that characterize Amis's subsequent fiction are already discernible in this book - its scatalogical and satiric treatment of sex, its comic description of the indignities of bodily life (spots, smells, toilet habits, sexual infection and the like), and above all its inventive deployment of language. The protagonist and narrator is Charles Highway who spends the last five hours of his nineteenth year reading over his diaries covering the last year of his adolescence, a year in which he manages to seduce Rachel and gain entry to Oxford University. The diaries reveal a representative cool young man of the swinging early 1970s. What is distinctive about the book is its infatuation with the primacy of writing over experience. Experience only becomes real for Charles when it is written down. He prefers reading about his doings of the last year to spending time with Rachel. She has been subdued by stratagems already recorded in one of his many notebooks, Conquests and Techniques: A Synthesis (the use of italics forming its own comment on Charles' literary pretentiousness).
    [Show full text]
  • Elizabeth Jane Howard: a Dangerous Innocence Free Download
    ELIZABETH JANE HOWARD: A DANGEROUS INNOCENCE FREE DOWNLOAD Artemis Cooper | 384 pages | 22 Sep 2016 | Hodder & Stoughton General Division | 9781848549272 | English | London, United Kingdom Elizabeth Jane Howard: A Dangerous Innocence by Artemis Cooper (Paperback, 2017) Wrongand edited two anthologies, including The Lover's Companion She also wrote a book of short stories, Mr. Following her divorce from her first husband, the celebrated naturalist Peter Scott, Jane embarked on a string of high-profile affairs with Cecil Day-Lewis, Arthur Koestler and Laurie Lee, which turned her into a literary femme fatale. Howard sulked if anyone asked him to recount his exploits Elizabeth Jane Howard: A Dangerous Innocence the Nazis. It is as compelling and unified Elizabeth Jane Howard: A Dangerous Innocence a novel, while recounting a full, messy, complex human story. Kingsley Amis. More filters. How sugary is YOUR pumpkin spice latte? However, it was still interesting to read a more 'impartial' account of E I'm a massive fan of Elizabeth Jane Howard so was quite excited when I saw this book reviewed in a newspaper. And yet the unnamed narrator in the novel, who drifts aimlessly and unhappily through much of the novel, is Elizabeth Jane Howard: A Dangerous Innocence much unlike EJH - who really fought for herself, demanding that she be allowed to be an actress in the early war years, despite much family opposition. The couple have two children, Nella and Adam. Mar 28, Annie Booker rated it it was amazing. I think she was very needy and it Elizabeth Jane Howard: A Dangerous Innocence this aspect of her nature that led to the incident which inspired Falling.
    [Show full text]
  • Kingsley Amis
    THE ART OF FICTION NO. 59 KINGSLEY AMIS Kingsley Amis, the former Angry Young Man, lives in a large, early-nineteenth-century house beside a wooded common. To reach it, one makes a journey similar to that described by the narrator of Girl, 20 when he visits Sir Roy Vandervane: first by tube to the end of the Northern Line at Barnet; then, following a phone call from the station to say where one is, on foot up a stiff slope; and finally down a suburban road. But instead of being picked up en route by Sir Roy’s black chum, Gilbert, I was intercepted by Amis’s tall and imposing blond wife, the novelist Elizabeth Jane Howard. Amis’s study was a picture of bohemian disorder. Scattered across the floor were several teetering piles of poetry books and a mass of old 78 r.p.m. jazz records, while the big Adler typewriter on his desk was almost hidden behind a screen of empty bottles of sparkling wine which he’d recently sampled in his capacity as drink correspondent for Penthouse. A more sober note was struck by some shelves containing a complete Encyclopaedia Britannica, a thirteen-volume O.E.D., and various other authoritative tomes, but this was quickly dispelled by the sight of a small sherry cask in one corner, full, I was told, of whiskey. For someone whose only regular exercise is strolling to and from the local pub, Amis at fifty-three is well preserved, with just a modest paunch hinted at beneath the light blue pullover and brown slacks he was wearing when we met.
    [Show full text]
  • Elizabeth Jane Howard
    Elizabeth Jane Howard The writer Elizabeth Jane Howard (1923-2014) spent much time during her formative years at her grandparents' houses near Battle, first at Home Place in Whatlington, then at The Beacon near Staplecross. She used Home Place as the setting for her best-selling "Cazalet Chronicles", a five- novel family saga spanning the period before, during, and after the Second World War. Battle, its station, shops, and surroundings, is highly recognisable; Howard was meticulously accurate in the details of her settings. This accuracy contributes to the charm and readability of her novels. Her readers feel drawn into a real place, inhabited by real people. Howard's grandfather – “the Brig" in the novels – ran the family timber business. He renovated his Sussex houses using fine quality panelling and floors made of jarrah wood, a rare wood from Western Australia; some of these interiors survive. The family was comfortably off and traditional in its attitudes. Sons joined the family firm, daughters were educated mainly at home, by governesses. Jane, as Elizabeth Jane Howard was always known, lived in London with her father David, who was charming but "duplicitous and unsafe", and her mother Kit, daughter of the composer Sir Arthur Somervell. Kit had given up a career with Diaghilev's Ballets Russes for an ultimately unhappy marriage to the philandering David. Jane, acutely aware of tensions which she would later examine in her fiction, took refuge in the warm, relaxed atmosphere of the extended family life in Sussex. "I spent the mornings up apple trees reading Captain Marryat and R.M.
    [Show full text]