READING WAUGH:
Have finished reading Waugh's diary after having read a newer biography by Philip Eade. Whilst learning a good deal about the context and background of Waugh's writing I was struck by two things.
One that he drank a good deal - I mean a great deal. I think he said about himself that he managed to consume 500 bottles of wine in a year. He certainly consumed a great deal whilst at Oxford.
Continued - Thoughts on Waugh.
His diaries also revel his tortured relationship with his farther and brother. Some of his resentment it seems spilled over to his attitude to his children - or some of then - such as Bron. He had many I suppose as a good catholic he would.
Early on from the biography by Eade and to some extent from his diary he was more than likely bisexual but by the time he married his second wife - Laura - he settled into a heterosexual life contentedly.
Was he a great writer? Hard to asses as some if not much of his worked can be regarded as topical of the time he wrote and now might seem dated. But clearly some of his work still resonates - such as Brideshead...
Another Biography:
My other biography that I've bee reading is "Anthony Powell - Dancing to the Music of Time" by Hilary Spurling. Powell has always fascinated me - I have read his sequence of Novels A Dance to the Music of Time with much pleasure. They are a social and cultural chronical of a particular age and also of psychological insights into personality. I do recommend these as well as his other novels - e.g. Afternoon Me, From a View to A Death and What's become of Waring.
Contemporary of Waugh and Graham Green he was a central figure in a particularly fruitful time in English letter in the UK.
In addition t hos fiction Powell wrote about Aubrey and his "Brief Lives". In 1949 he published John Aubrey and His Friends He began this project during the war to preserve his sanity. Until the appearance of Ruth Scurr's (Fellow of Gonville and Caius College) his was the definitive biography of Aubrey.
OTHER BOOKS & THINGS:
There is a new book on Edward Lear, by Sara Lodge. I've only just dipped my toe into this but will pick it up seriously soon. The subject, Lear, fascinates me. I think I had my first serious introduction to him by Philip Hofer at the Houghton Library, Harvard. Of course some of hos nonsense verse I had know from a young age, More on Lear and this book later.
Things French:
I am still slowly working my way through Annie Ernaux's Les années and The End of Eddy by Édouard Louis. The Ernaux is a book one can dip into and out of without loosing the thread of the narrative.
