Folio Archives 174: The Loved One by Evelyn Waugh 1993

The Loved One, An Anglo-American Tragedy by Evelyn Waugh 1993

This short easy to read large format book is an absolute hoot!

Written in 1948, Evelyn Waugh takes the funeral industry to task, along with the British expatriate community in Hollywood and the film industry. It is a classic of British satirical humour. It depicts a world where love, reputation, and death cost a very great deal. Death, American-style, is wrapped up and sold like a package holiday and the books characters include a naïve Californian corpse beautician, and Mr Joyboy, the master of the embalmer's art. Somehow Waugh makes death hilarious.

The book was written after Waugh visited California in 1947, and there is an eleven page extract of his biography by Christopher Sykes that acts as an introduction. Then the fun starts……

The eight very colourful full page (one double page) illustrations by Beryl Cook are as over the top as the text. The 107 + xvii book is bound in iridescent orange cloth, cover blocked with a maroon flaming heart. The 28.7x19cm. slipcase is dark red, while the endpapers are pale pink and pattern printed in grey with the word “Aimée”.

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An index of the other illustrated reviews in the "Folio Archives" series can be viewed here.

I love Cook's illustrations for Mr. Norris Changes Trains, so this book looks amazing to me. Would love to find a copy some day...

I picked up a copy of this on eBay a couple of months ago, and by coincidence I started reading it last night. Another coincidence relating to this book - at almost 29 cm, it's taller than most FS books. Only one other book in my (modest) collection of 80 or so Folio publications is the same height: The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, which is also the only other title in my collection to be illustrated by Beryl Cook.

Both Mr Norris Changes Trains and The Loved One are among the nine titles from the 1990s made available in special quarter-leather and marbled paper bindings, in very limited quantities - most of them just 100. The Loved One apparently comes in pink leather, and is described by Folio 60 as '... a wonderfully kitschy production.' I have three of these nine titles in the special bindings, but much as I like the Beryl Cook illustrations, I didn't think either of these two books quite merited either the time needed to track them down or the vast cost. The Isherwood standard edition is great however, and this review tempts me to track down the Waugh too.

Thanks as ever, Warwick, for this magnificent review series.

>4 affle: Do you have the full list of titles by any chance? I have 'The Loved One' and would like to collect the others. I believe 'Brideshead Revisited' is one. Thanks.

>5 Bath_Bookworm:
You can research the full list of FS books, and books by particular authors and artists on the FSD Complete list wiki at https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/Groups:BOOKS_PUBLISHED_BY_THE_FOLIO_SOCI...

The list of FS specially bound standard editions can be found on the FSD wiki at https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/Groups:Folio_Society_Devotees#Specially_...

>5 Bath_Bookworm:

Hello! I think I may have also just answered your question elsewhere on Facebook. And the response above is from "Dr Carter, the wonderful collector and FS historian" I referred to!

Here are a couple of other links to threads I referred to (which can also be accessed via the FSD Wiki):

http://www.librarything.com/topic/151317

http://www.librarything.com/topic/144801