Comments on: Revisiting Brideshead Yet Again

By: glenl

glenl — Mon, 18 May 2009 06:10:29 +0000

I put off watching the PBS series until after reading the book but then never read the book. This is the great thing about PBS: with Hollywood you would say, “I am putting off watching this movie until after I have read the comic book.” Yes, I have delayed this reading for too long.

By: Randy Fromm

Randy Fromm — Wed, 13 May 2009 11:16:07 +0000

I recall reading someplace, after one of my earlier readings of the book, that Waugh, with the aid of a young son of the then PM Churchill, had the manuscript delivered to the publishers from his post (I believe in Yugoslavia, among Tito and the rebels, though I could here be conflating his story with that of the author of Eastern Approaches) by diplomatic courier. I believe this might have been the same article in which I read of the idea of the book as a roman a clef.

One of the things which has always intrigued me about the book and of which I am particularly aware this reading is the wonderful characterization by which the players are drawn. Even without the PBS series banging about in my head, they are among the best in literature. Even those that Forster would call “flat” characters are round in their contribution to the overall feel of Ryder’s reminiscences.

By: glenl

glenl — Wed, 13 May 2009 06:51:03 +0000

You have me at a disadvantage as I have neither read Brideshead nor have I seen the PBS series. Or, perhaps, it is I who has the advantage because Jeremy Irons is not banging around in my head.

Waugh is a consummate stage-setter. After finishing Book One I went back to read the Prologue, just to admire his craft, and few books draw me to do that without being annoying. This story must have been good therapy for Waugh who joined the Royal Marines just five years before Brideshead Revisited was published. Presupposition aside, it is an interesting tale with articulate connections: Ryder and his aloof but entertaining father against Sebastian and his excessively perfect family.

For a while this is paradise for Ryder but a descent into hell for Sebastian.