A Handful Of Dust By Evelyn Waugh (Paperback, 2000)

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Taking its title from TS Eliot's modernist poem The Waste Land Evelyn Waugh's A Handful of Dust is a chronicle of Britain's decadence & social disintegration between the First & Second World Wars This Penguin Modern Classics edition is edited with an introduction & notes by Robert Murray Davis After seven years of marriage the beautiful Lady Brenda Last is bored with life at Hetton Abbey the Gothic mansion that is the pride & joy of her husband Tony She drifts into an affair with the shallow socialite John Beaver & forsakes Tony for the Belgravia set Brilliantly combining tragedy comedy & savage irony A Handful of Dust captures the irresponsible mood of the 'crazy & sterile generation' between the wars This breakdown of the Last marriage is a painful comic re-working of Waugh's own divorce & a symbol of the disintegration of society If you enjouyed A Handful of Dust you might like Waugh's Vile Bodies also available in Penguin Modern Classics' One of the twentieth century's most chilling & bitter novels; & one of its best' Nicholas Lezard Guardian' One of the most distinguished novels of the century' Frank Kermode' This is a masterpiece of stylish satire & is funny too a marvellous book' John Banville Irish Times