From a View to a Death
by Anthony Powell
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Unsavory artists, titled boobs, and charlatans with an affinity for Freud ?such are the oddballs whose antics animate the early novels of the late British master Anthony Powell. A genius of social satire delivered with a very dry wit, Powell builds his comedies on the foibles of British high society between the wars, delving into subjects as various as psychoanalysis, the film industry, publishing, and (of course) sex. More explorations of relationships and vanity than plot-driven show more narratives, these slim novels reveal the early stirrings of the unequaled style, ear for dialogue, and eye for irony that would reach their caustic peak in Powell ?s epic A Dance to the Music of Time. From a View to a Death takes us to a dilapidated country estate where an ambitious artist of questionable talent, a family of landed aristocrats wondering where the money has gone, and a secretly cross-dressing squire all commingle among the ruins. Written from a vantage point both high and necessarily narrow, Powell ?s early novels nevertheless deal in the universal themes that would become a substantial part of his oeuvre: pride, greed, and what makes people behave as they do. Filled with eccentric characters and piercing insights, Powell ?s work is achingly hilarious, human, and true. show lessTags
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Powell was a long way off from the writer he became, but his ability to describe people coldly, wittily, probingly is well on display:
"Torquil was small and dark and hungry-looking, with an enormous head that looked as if it might snap off at any moment and fall from his shoulders. He was dressed in the prevailing Oxford fashion of a saffron-coloured high-necked jumper and dove-grey flannel trousers."
"[A]lthough after their marriage some of his habits came as a surprise to her, [Mrs. Passenger] only sometimes regretted it because she was a woman with a serene temperament and most of the time she had only a very vague idea of what was going on round her. Mr. Passenger himself sometimes liked his wife and sometimes disliked her but from show more the earliest days of their honeymoon he had made up his mind to brood about her as little as possible and for many years now he had remained successfully entrenched behind his own personality." show less
"Torquil was small and dark and hungry-looking, with an enormous head that looked as if it might snap off at any moment and fall from his shoulders. He was dressed in the prevailing Oxford fashion of a saffron-coloured high-necked jumper and dove-grey flannel trousers."
"[A]lthough after their marriage some of his habits came as a surprise to her, [Mrs. Passenger] only sometimes regretted it because she was a woman with a serene temperament and most of the time she had only a very vague idea of what was going on round her. Mr. Passenger himself sometimes liked his wife and sometimes disliked her but from show more the earliest days of their honeymoon he had made up his mind to brood about her as little as possible and for many years now he had remained successfully entrenched behind his own personality." show less
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61+ Works 13,440 Members
Anthony Powell was born on December 21, 1905 in Westminster, England and was educated at Eton College and Balliol College, Oxford. In 1926 he became an editor at Duckworth & Co. and later moved on to be a scriptwriter for Warner Brothers. By 1937 he was a regular contributor to The Spectator and the Daily Telegraph. From 1953-1959 Powell was the show more Literary Editor of Punch. His first book, The Barnard Letter, was published in 1928 and his first novel, Afternoon Men, was published in 1931. In 1951 Powell published A Question of Upbringing, which was the first of the 12-novel sequence A Dance to the Music of Time. In 1975 he published Hearing Secret Harmonies, which was the last novel of the sequence. Powell wrote Infants of the Spring, which is part of To Keep the Ball Rolling, his memoirs. He also published The Fisher King in 1986. Anthony Powell died peacefully at his home, The Chantry, aged 94 on March 28, 2000. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Some Editions
Common Knowledge
- Original publication date
- 1933
- Epigraph
- From a find to a check, from a check to a view, from a view to a death in the morning." John Peel.
- First words
- They drove uncertainly along the avenue that led to the house, through the bars of light that fell between the tree-trunks and made the shadows of the lime-trees strike obliquely across the gravel.
- Last words
- (Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)She went to her father's death to look for the cigar box.
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- Members
- 145
- Popularity
- 225,612
- Reviews
- 2
- Rating
- (3.87)
- Languages
- English
- Media
- Paper, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 10
- ASINs
- 11
