Evelyn Waugh: A Biography [Hardcover]

Selena Hastings (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 19, 1995

One of the foremost writers of our time, Evelyn Waugh was also one of its most extraordinary eccentrics, with a life full of comedy and conflict. Selina Hastings, who was granted unrestricted access to his personal papers by Waugh's family, has uncovered a wealth of new material in her eight years of research for this volume. Letters, diaries, and family photographs shed new light on Waugh's childhood, his affairs at Oxford, his ill-fated first marriage and subsequent romantic adventures, his World War II military service, and his enduring but thorny friendships with such notable figures as Diana Cooper, Ann Fleming, and Nancy Mitford. Perceptive, fascinating, by turns hilarious and tragic, Hastings's portrait gives us Waugh's glittering social life at Oxford, where he was a friend of Harold Acton, Cyril Connolly, Anthony Powell, and Alastair Graham, the inspiration for Sebastian Flyte in Brideshead Revisited. Waugh then followed a diverse career as schoolmaster, world traveler, war co

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

English biographer Hastings (Nancy Mitford) understands exactly the nature of her task, proclaiming at the start of this massive, elegantly written and exhaustively researched biography that her subject's reputation rests on two premises?"that he was one of the great prose stylists of the 20th century, and that as a man he was a monster." She was given unrestricted access to letters and diaries (many of them unpublished) and has come up with a study that is respectful of Waugh's accomplishments though perhaps excessively forgiving of his preposterous behavior toward friends, family and the world at large. Waugh (1903-1966) was a bullying, choleric man who frequently drank himself into oblivion, but whose wildly satiric humor endeared him to the smart set at Oxford and later in London and became the basis of the series of brilliant novels, written in the '20s and '30s, portraying that world. He was an unapologetic snob who genuinely believed that Britain's landed gentry were a superior race; who despised children (including most of his own), the lower classes, foreigners and modern life in general; and who was a passionate convert to the reactionary extremes of Roman Catholicism. (Nancy Mitford asked him how he reconciled "being so horrible with being a Christian." Waugh replied that he would be "even more horrible" except for his faith?"and anyway would have committed suicide years ago.") He hated Americans, and when Brideshead Revisited, the work for which he is probably best known, was a success in the U.S., he wrote: "I thought it in good taste before but now know it can't be." The entertainment value of Waugh's highly eccentric life, as of much of his work, is high, and Hastings has given the most detailed and graceful account of both yet to appear. Photos.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Sulking over his children's impertinence, Waugh wrote, "Thank God Christmas is over. I prefer Ash Wednesday." He also referred to an early Oxford homosexual partner as "the friend of my heart." Both statements are quintessential Waugh: writer, traveler, sometimes alcoholic, fevered Catholic convert, satirist, military man, snob, husband, father, and eccentric romantic. Hastings, acclaimed for her Nancy Mitford: A Biography (Dutton, 1986), covers all the above and more, including Waugh's turbulent relationships with his father and brother, his two wives, Cyril Connolly, Diana Cooper, Randolph Churchill, and Mitford. Hastings brilliantly evokes Waugh's reverence for British aristocracy and English Catholicism as Waugh did in his great novel Brideshead Revisited. Many of the Brideshead characters are partial portraits of the people in Waugh's personal life, including himself: a self-portrait in the persona of the character Charles Ryder. In the autobiographical A Little Learning (1964), Waugh wrote, "At Oxford I was reborn in full youth." Hastings has achieved yet another rebirth for Waugh, this time a full memorial. Highly recommended for serious readers.?Robert L. Kelly, Fort Wayne Community Schs., Ind.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 723 pages
• Publisher: Houghton Mifflin (April 19, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 039571821X
• ISBN-13: 978-0395718216
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.1 x 2.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #878,241 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Enthralling, May 29, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Evelyn Waugh: A Biography (Hardcover)

The best biography I have read of Waugh. In fact, one of the best biographies I have ever read. The depth of research is most impressive. The style of writing is very agreeable.

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great biography, miserable subject, January 6, 2008

By 

hola (penryn, ca USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Evelyn Waugh: A Biography (Hardcover)

I've read two other biographies of Evelyn Waugh, but this is the best of the lot. Ms. Hastings is not writing a literary life of her subject, nor a elegiac review of his life and friends. This is Evelyn Waugh, warts and all. And boy, does he have them.

I have to say, towards the end of the book, I got to the point that I wished he would die already. The picture presented is of an alcoholic snob who wasted his talents at every opportunity. How he had any friends is a mystery.

Ms. Hastings presents a thoroughly researched biography, thus the evolution of Waugh from a middle-class younger son (his older brother was the family favorite - much to his resentment) to an estate-owning squire with seven children is clearly documented. Her clear vision of her subject is such that the reader doesn't really find him sympathetic at any time (at least I didn't). I particularly like it that she doesn't manufacture reasons or excuses for his many times outrageous behavior, as indeed, there are none.

Ms. Hastings give an excellent picture of the 'bright young things' of which Waugh was a member, as well as the lives of the upper class and literary set of the UK before, during, and after WWII. Her sources are clear, and her bibliography is one of the best I've seen.

This is a very good book, very well written - even if the subject is a monster.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Jitterbug Blues, June 28, 2007

By 

David Schweizer "Almawood" (Kansas, USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Evelyn Waugh: A Biography (Hardcover)

The between-the-wars generation had it tough. They missed the slaughter in the trenches, were too old for the Marxism of the 30s, and never had it quite so good as their school days at Eton and Oxford. It was a generation consumed by nostalgia. They also had 19th century educations which did little to prepare them for the bleak post-war welfare state. They hated the angry young men of the 1950s, but never could form a coherent enough reaction to be called the angry old men. That would certainly have fit Evelyn Waugh. Cranky, brilliant, and so it has been said, hilarious, Waugh was a kind of literary W.C. Fields. This bio does a very good job, it seems to me, of introducing the author to general readers. Hastings writes well, and tells all without being unseemly or too personal, or too prudishly 'politically correct' as many contemporary biographers have become. There are other one-volume books out on Waugh but this one stands out for its graceful prose.