Because this is a collection of quotes from people who knew Bowie in some capacity, usually a professional one, this book is on the repetitive side. IBecause this is a collection of quotes from people who knew Bowie in some capacity, usually a professional one, this book is on the repetitive side. It's also very top heavy on the adulation. Bowie is very much of our time. There's no question he changed lives. But the suspicion is that history will see him more as a popular culture celebrity than the significant artist this book wants us to view him as. It was interesting to learn that while he was living in Switzerland for tax evasion purposes his only company was often Roger Moore who came to his house every evening and bored him with the same stories. At the time he was earning £24 million a year but still he didn't possess the freedom to choose his company. ...more
Begins with the bar mitzvah of Harry Ettlinger in the synagogue of Karlsruhe. It was to be the last bar mitzvah ever held there as a few days later itBegins with the bar mitzvah of Harry Ettlinger in the synagogue of Karlsruhe. It was to be the last bar mitzvah ever held there as a few days later it was burned to the ground during Kristallnacht. Harry and his family manage to get out of Germany just in time. Later Harry will become one of the monuments men. The book then introduces us to several other men employed to protect monuments of cultural importance and track down the art stolen by the Nazis. I enjoyed following these men through seminal moments in the war - the invasion of Sicily, the Normandy landings, the battle of the Bulge. But this is a rather convoluted book probably because we are asked to follow too many characters. This means there's a certain amount of recapping and repetition. It's admirably researched. George Clooney turned it into an action film but made up most of the action. It's a minor miracle though that we didn't lose more great works of art during the war and this book shows how close that eventuality was. ...more
A charming bittersweet novella about a man recovering from the horrors of the first world war who is commissioned to uncover a medieval fresco of The A charming bittersweet novella about a man recovering from the horrors of the first world war who is commissioned to uncover a medieval fresco of The Last Judgement in a village church which has been whitewashed over and collected centuries of grease and grime. Tom Birkin sleeps in the belfry of the church during his stay and works high up on precarious scaffolding - telling metaphors for the uncertain nature of his post-war circumstances which include an adulterous wife and a nervous facial twitch. It's a narrative that paints an idyllic picture of country life as a force of restoration and muses a lot on the transient nature of all happiness. It contains some memorable characters and is very well written. ...more
This was too whimsical for me and I abandoned it. It's about an irritable English spinster who goes to Venice when the woman she lives with dies. For This was too whimsical for me and I abandoned it. It's about an irritable English spinster who goes to Venice when the woman she lives with dies. For it to work it needed a memorable lead character but I found Julia both dull and implausible. She is a retired teacher who didn't like teaching or children; she is an atheist and a former communist but all this felt like irrelevant biography - told but never shown. It's a book that depicts a much kinder world than the one we live in. Julia somehow manages to charm four young people into befriending her within days of arriving in Venice. It's surprising sometimes how seemingly innocuous can be the details which prevent you from suspending disbelief. But why young hippy twins restoring a church would take an interest in a grumpy old woman baffled me. It also baffled me what credentials they had to be restoring a church. Again this is told, not shown, as if the author couldn't be bothered to research the art of restoration. It did though remind me of what a wonderful novel A Month in the Country is - where the author has artful command of the discipline of restoration. This novel becomes even more implausible when the boy twin disappears with one of the panels of the church's inventory. You can't help asking yourself what church would allow a pair of wayward kids with no adult professional supervision to restore a church. The novel now becomes a kind of genteel version of the De Vinci Code. But there wasn't enough reality in the book for me to ever feel engaged. Even Venice is told rather than shown with lots of guide book info but little enlivening detail. A parallel narrative recounts a fictional account of the apocryphal story of Tobit and Tobias which I liked better but not enough to see through to the end. It's a no from me. ...more
An introspective very well written novel about a Jewish man with Hungarian roots and his relationship with his father and how it is altered after his An introspective very well written novel about a Jewish man with Hungarian roots and his relationship with his father and how it is altered after his father's death by a painting. The narrator is a B-list actor, emotionally immature and prone to self-pity. He blames his undemonstrative taciturn father for his mid-life crisis. The painting is by the Hungarian Ervin Kalman, worth millions now and there's a mystery how it came into the family just before the Nazis arrived in Budapest. The narrator's father refuses to speak about it. Together with his Jewish lawyer, the narrator will himself have to solve the mystery and in the process reconnect with his family and his Jewish heritage. There's an ingenious twist towards the end. I thoroughly enjoyed this meditation on identity and the selective and protean nature of memory. ...more
Interesting rather than riveting. This book about British bohemia in the first half of the 20th century is divided into sections – the choice of hardsInteresting rather than riveting. This book about British bohemia in the first half of the 20th century is divided into sections – the choice of hardship over material comforts, the push for sexual freedom, new approaches to child rearing, rebellion through dress, revolutionising eating habits, changing the nature of domesticity. The book is largely made up of anecdotes, snapshots of the lives of many artists and writers, most of whom not so well known. It’s the kind of book that helps inform you who you would like to read about in more detail – in my case, Augustus John and Dylan Thomas. The research that must have gone into it is very impressive and it’s well written. However I’m not sure I learned much that isn’t essentially common knowledge. I actually bought this on a misapprehension that it was about Vanessa Bell and how her house Charleston was managed. Teach me to read the blurb of a book more closely before hitting the buy now button. ...more
[image] Often a novel’s success depends on how intimately the author knows his characters and how successful he is in conveying this intimacy. Though t [image] Often a novel’s success depends on how intimately the author knows his characters and how successful he is in conveying this intimacy. Though this novel is well researched and decently written I never really felt Croft got under Schiele’s skin.
It’s dangerous (though perhaps commercially not a bad idea) to write a fictional account of a historical figure. You either conform to all the preconceived notions and join those dots or you start from scratch with the available information and perform an imaginative act of empathy. Much of the novel is written in dialogue, almost like a screenplay. There’s little of his painting methods; almost no attempt to fathom Schiele’s inner life, his motivations and demons. The novel is very visual, an aspect I liked. But Croft rather shoots himself in the foot because anyone who admires Schiele will be irritated by his rather unsympathetic portrait of the artist. Sure Schiele wasn’t a model of ethical high standards but a novel surely should give us a rounded picture of a character. For example, it doesn’t really matter how much verisimilitude there is in Mantel’s Cromwell. Fact is she created a living breathing compelling human being and seemed to have access to every corner of his heart and soul. I certainly didn’t feel that about Croft’s Schiele. Shame. ...more
The scope of this novel is hugely impressive. We are taken on bombing raids to Berlin, into the world of art theft in Florence, to partisan battles inThe scope of this novel is hugely impressive. We are taken on bombing raids to Berlin, into the world of art theft in Florence, to partisan battles in the hills of Tuscany, to the offices of the secret police in Florence, to Italian internment camps and to the Nazi death camps. And yet for all the pervasive horror of war this is essentially an uplifting novel written with sustained imaginative vitality about how people touch each other and how humanity prevails.
We see WW2 through three perspectives – these are three friends who met at art college in Florence before the war. Freddie becomes the pilot of a Lancaster bomber, Isabella, his Italian wife, is a painter in Florence and Oskar, a German Jew, is trying to avoid the Gestapo in Italy. All three narratives are utterly compelling in their different ways. Isabella is dragged into the world of art forgery and the fascist/partisan conflict; Oskar and his young daughter are hunted by the Nazis and have to depend on the kindness of strangers and are constantly in fear of their treachery (huge rewards were offered for information leading to the arrest of Jews). And Freddie is just trying to stay alive - the account of life in Bomber Command is a brilliant feat of imagination – a succession of thrilling set pieces in which you feel you’re up there in the plane. The control of the suspense throughout is done with great skill. You genuinely worry for the safety of the characters. Oskar’s efforts to keep his daughter safe is a very moving account of the love of a father for his daughter, just as Freddie and Isabella’s story is a moving depiction of the love between a separated husband and wife. It’s also a brilliant portrait of Italy and in particular Florence itself. I didn’t want it to end. Fully recommended. Along with All the Light We Cannot See my favourite read of 2015....more
David Halifax is an American art student who wins a mysterious scholarship to study in a Parisian atelier under an “enigmatic” white Russian teacher iDavid Halifax is an American art student who wins a mysterious scholarship to study in a Parisian atelier under an “enigmatic” white Russian teacher in 1940. Pankratov, the teacher, has inexplicably destroyed all his own paintings and is now engaged in making forgeries of old master paintings. It’s never really explained why he has destroyed his own work. Pankratov also has a daughter who models at the atelier and who hates him. Again we don’t understand why she hates him. When war breaks out Halifax decides to stay on in Paris and he and Pankratov begin forging paintings to pass on to the Nazis as the genuine article.
Halifax himself narrates the story. The ironic thing about this novel is it’s a bit like a forgery itself. It’s well written, professionally crafted and, apart from a couple of high profile errors (most notably the Musee d’Orsee making an appearance in 1940) it’s decently researched and yet it never quite comes alive, never benefits from the charge of inspiration. It reads like a commissioned novel rather than a labour of love. Halifax himself is the prime problem. He’s essentially a hollow character. He has no friends, no loves and fails to convince as anything but a plot device. There’s little character development at all in this novel. We watch the characters rather than feel for them.
There’s a faintly ridiculous back story involving an Uncle Charlie and the mysterious scholarship which is dropped early on. And the story of Pankratov’s daughter is equally lacking in meaning. I did quite enjoy The Forger but it’s not a novel I would feel confident to recommend. ...more
“My theme is memory, that winged host.” There’s a haunting elegiac beauty to this novel which maybe makes it seem a little better than it really is. T“My theme is memory, that winged host.” There’s a haunting elegiac beauty to this novel which maybe makes it seem a little better than it really is. The writing is gorgeous, especially when Waugh is dealing with the passing of time. He’s rather like the English Fitzgerald in this book – the nostalgia for youth and high emotion, the mourning an era which he beautifully romanticises and painting what follows as grey and turgid. The characters are all brilliantly conceived and drawn, uniquely memorable and contributing vital current to the book’s plot. It’s also a fascinating study of Catholicism and the nature of faith. Socially it’s an extremely conservative novel. Waugh does not like change but it’s this stubborn conservatism that allows him to create such a powerful atmosphere of heartbreaking nostalgia. ...more
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