Evelyn Waugh revisits Brideshead Revisited in its 1959 revised edition; "It was a bleak period of present privation and threatening disaster — the period of soya beans and Basic English — and in consequence the book is infused with a kind of gluttony, for food and wine, for the splendours of the recent past, and for rhetorical and ornamental language which now, with a full stomach, I find distasteful."
The contrast between war-ravaged 'soya bean' England and the luxuriant hedonistic memories of Charles and his friendship with Sebastian was, for me, the most emotionally engaging and well written part of the novel. Overall I wanted to like this book much, much more than I actually did.
Waugh's depiction of love and marriage, a commentary within the frames of Catholicism and the English Upper Class, was simply that. Julia and Charles' blossoming relationship was sort of mechanically written, as was other relationships/affairs between the other characters (except Charles and Sebastian's -- perhaps if it was called "Brideshead Revisited: the Adventures of Charles and Sebastian," it would have been better). Waugh can wax lyrical on the delicious and extravagant, but is reluctant to get emotive in his description of romance and its turmoils. There are glimpses of witty and vibrant Marchmain family vignettes, but in obvious contrast Waugh turns the latter part of the book into a serious narrative with hints of redemption and/or resolution for some characters, but it is generally boring because I had little empathy for any of the characters to begin with.
Brideshead Revisited: a great and sweeping bittersweet reverie of a British soldier, rests comfortably on this idea and doesn't take it too much further.
What was your all important score on the popular penguin scale out of ten?
ReplyDeleteWe all kind of concluded with a similar opinion to yours that the second half of the book was pretty lame and the first half pretty bad ass. Except for poms who loved it all because of one paragraph.
Its an important paragraph though.
ReplyDeleteI mostly agree; the Adventures of Charles and Sebastian would have made a much more enjoyable book, but it wouldn't have made as profound a statement as this did on the nature of divinity, which is I think what he wanted to do. I believe it requires a suspension of disbelief; acceptance of a point of view, which perhaps counts against it. I think, it fits into that neat category of books that I haven't particularly loved or found utterly engaging but still rank very highly in terms of what they set out to do and how they achieve it. If you know what I'm saying.
I gave it 5 out of 10. A few minor moments of greatness. ALl other moments: OK.
ReplyDeleteI hear you, Poms, fair point and tried to suspend, but couldn't really.
:o
ReplyDeletecontroversial 5/10!
that totally sets off our average system.
Good to have a complete hater, everyone else was way to agreeable on this book
ReplyDelete