Knowing Waugh, he was probably being a wee bit ironic. Yet he did write "a very beautiful book."
On March 13, 1944, Evelyn Waugh informed his friend Lady Dorothy Lygon: “I am writing a very beautiful book, to bring tears, about very rich people, beautiful, high born people who live in palaces and have no troubles except what they make themselves and those are mainly the demons of sex and drink which after all are easy to bear as troubles go nowadays”. This book would be published the following year as Brideshead Revisited, and would portray a family not unlike the Lygons of Madresfield Court in Worcestershire, who were indeed rich, (mostly) beautiful, high born and had more than their fair share of troubles with sex and drink, which they in fact found quite hard to bear. Paula Byrne’s object in writing Mad World was “to find the hidden key to Waugh’s great novel, to unlock for the first time the full extent to which Brideshead encodes and subtly transforms the author’s own experience”.
There is a very hilarious interview Waugh did with the BBC back in the 60s, that comes across like a clash of civilisations. I was looking for it on You Tube, but could only find a barely audible transcript. It went off so badly, I think it may have caused his premature death, especially the part that tried to put him on the spot about capital punishment. When I find it, I am going to post it.
ReplyDeleteBrideshead Revisited est l'un des fleurons de la littérature anglaise du XXème siècle. C'est aussi l'un des livres qui m'a le plus touché ces dernières années et je l'ai relu dans sa traduction française à trois reprises. Le site consacré à ce livre sur The Monarchist est absolument remarquable surtout "The Companion to Brideshead Revisited" qui est une mine d'informations non seulement sur le roman lui-même, mais aussi sur l'Angleterre de ces années là. C'est la lecture de ce livre qui m'a donné envie de séjourner à Oxford où j'ai retrouvé une très belle évocation du roman en visitant les collèges,leurs jardins et en assistant aux offices du soir à Christ Church. Je trouve que Waugh, contrairement à certains de ses collègues écrivains moins chanceux, a eu la bonne fortune que son roman fut adapté de manière irréprochable à la télévision. La série a été diffusée en France il y a une vingtaine d'années et connut un fort succès. Quant au film de cinéma récemment sorti en Angleterre, il n'a pas trouvé de distributeur en france tant il est médiocre dit-on... Je souhaite que tout lecteur francophone de ce commentaire aille dans une librairie et se procure "Brideshead revisited", il en retirera un grand plaisir j'en suis certain.
ReplyDeleteLong live the Old England!