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Title: Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh ISBN: 0-316-92634-5 Publisher: Back Bay Books Pub. Date: September, 1999 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.18 (45 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: a nostalgic look at the past
Comment: Brideshead Revisited is one of my favorite books of all time. Alas, this, being my first journey into the mind of Evelyn Waugh, has ruined me for his other novels as they are not very similar to this one. This book, for me, has had a magical aura. It was written Post World War I, as a treatise to the past, which explains the grand departure from style and content from other novels. Charles Ryder returns to the Brideshead estate, releasing memories of his school days and his friendship with the exquisite Sebastian Flyte.
This novel also carries an extreme theme of Catholicism and a family's attempt to flee from the faith of their mother. Like an unwoven spider web, the children, Sebastian, Julia, and Cordelia eventually become ensnared and return to the religion their mother showed them when they were children.
This is an amazing novel. Whimsical and sad, at once. This is a must-read.
Rating: 4
Summary: Troubled Genius
Comment: Evelyn Waugh's BRIDESHEAD REVISITED is a troubling and flawed work of genius. Written during World War II and framed by the conversion of the Brideshead estate into an army camp during the war, the novel depicts the youth and early adulthood of one Charles Ryder. The 40-year-old army captain that the war makes of Ryder recalls the days of his optimistic youth as a close friend of teddy-bear toting Sebastian Flyte, younger son of the Brideshead household and classmate of his at Oxford. Sebastian awakens much in Charles, and it is arguable whether he doesn't awaken more than does his sister Julia, who later becomes Ryder's fiancee.
For the 220 or so pages that constitute Part One this book comes off as a splendid (though not aggressively hostile) satire of upper class British society in the 1920s. Especially of the particular damage that the "long-suffering" Catholic mother can do to her loved ones (I kept thinking, "O, the martyrdom!" every time Lady Marchmain used one of her patented guilt trips to twist the psychological and spiritual arms of her children--Sebastian most often.) BRIDESHEAD REVISITED is also a powerful "lost illusions" type of novel, but the particular illusions lost don't seem any more attractive than the reality that replaces them. "Henceforth I live in a world of three dimensions--with the aid of my five senses," says Charles, but that seems limiting, doesn't it? It does to Waugh but his answer isn't necessarily any more appealing. Part One is hilarious and promises much. Part Two, sorry to say, does not deliver on that promise. The satire stops and the soap opera begins. Sebastian disappears and Ryder becomes a much less sympathetic character--why he would fall in love with Julia in the first place is hard to fathom.
A great problem with this novel is that it seems to place the Catholic religion in an unflattering light to the extent that the reader would think that Waugh himself was anti-Catholic. Think again. He was a convert well before he wrote this book and despite the fact that he DOES present Catholicism as being the last thing anyone would want to fall into, people fall. The fact that they fall into rather than embrace Catholicism sucks away whatever joy might have been left in the novel--I was reminded of the line from Kevin Smith's movie DOGMA, paraphrased here: "Catholics don't celebrate their faith, they mourn it."
So, in celebration I must say that to call Waugh a fine writer is to sell him far too short. He is a masterful stylist and a brilliant wit who can lift you up and get under your skin. Let him.
Rating: 5
Summary: Grace
Comment: This is a fairly sizeable novel. It would normally take me about three days with pretty substantial reading time during those days. But there was just something about it, and I made time and read this one pretty much straight through. It is easily one of the most wonderful novels I have ever read.
There is so much to like about it. There is sheer joy in reading Waugh's prose as small nuggets of humor and beauty are uncovered throughout. The characters are pretty over-the-top (done on purpose) which makes them entertaining, but the depth of the characters is the truly striking thing. It's usually between the lines, but these characters are changing dramatically throughout, and for the better. I think the theological discussion running throughout the novel is what really makes it rise to true greatness. Waugh's making a compelling argument for a moral universe, and he is revealing what God's grace may look like working in people's lives.
Brideshead Revisited is true masterpiece that really cannot be missed by any lover of literature or by any person looking for some meaning out there. It's a joy in every sense of the word. This is one book I'm going to come back to.
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Title: A Handful of Dust by Evelyn Waugh ISBN: 0316926051 Publisher: Back Bay Books Pub. Date: September, 1999 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
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Title: Decline and Fall by Evelyn Waugh ISBN: 0316926078 Publisher: Back Bay Books Pub. Date: September, 1999 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
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Title: Vile Bodies by Evelyn Waugh ISBN: 0316926116 Publisher: Back Bay Books Pub. Date: September, 1999 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title:Brideshead Revisited ASIN: B00005JLG2 Publisher: Acorn Media Pub. Date: 25 June, 2002 List Price(USD): $79.95 Comparison N/A, buy it from Amazon for $69.56 |
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Title: Scoop by Evelyn Waugh ISBN: 0316926108 Publisher: Back Bay Books Pub. Date: September, 1999 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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