Brideshead Revisited

Product Description

Brideshead Revisited" is Evelyn Waugh's stunning novel of duty & desire set amongst the decadent faded glory of the English aristocracy in the run-up to the Second World War. The most nostalgic & reflective of Evelyn Waugh's novels " Brideshead Revisited" looks back to the golden age before the Second World War. It tells the story of Charles Ryder's infatuation with the Marchmains & the rapidly disappearing world of privilege they inhabit. Enchanted first by Sebastian Flyte at Oxford then by his doomed Catholic family in particular his remote sister Julia Charles comes finally to recognise his spiritual & social distance from them. Evelyn Waugh (1903-66) was born in Hampstead second son of Arthur Waugh publisher & literary critic & brother of Alec Waugh the popular novelist. In 1928 he published his first work a life of Dante Gabriel Rossetti & his first novel " Decline & Fall" which was soon followed by " Vile Bodies" (1930) "A Handful of Dust" (1934) & " Scoop" (1938). In 1939 he was commissioned in the Royal Marines & later transferred to the Royal Horse Guards serving in the Middle East & in Yugoslavia. In 1942 he published " Put Out More Flags" & then in 1945 " Brideshead Revisited". " Men at Arms" (1952) was the first volume of " The Sword of Honour" trilogy & won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize; the other volumes " Officers & Gentlemen" & " Unconditional Surrender" followed in 1955 & 1961. If you enjoyed " Brideshead Revisited" you might like Waugh's " Vile Bodies" also available in " Penguin Classics". " Lush & evocative... Expresses at once the profundity of change & the indomitable endurance of the human spirit". (" The Times")."