Reading 1001 discussion

What a wonderful romp through the Roaring Twenties! I would have probably rated this a five star read if I had not just finished Anna Karenina. I started it just after midnight (in the spirit of The Monthly Challenge) and could not put it down. It is so long since I read a book at one sitting because I could just not stop reading, that this will become one of my favourites. From the indelible image of the rather staid theology student being divested of his trousers in an unfortunate encounter with the drunken members of the Bollinger Club, through to the antihero's return to Oxford after a year of what can aptly be described as madcap adventures, the book is full of bons mots.

Waugh skewers Oxbridge, public schools, high society, prison reform, and nearly everything else. I had not expected such fun. The title, which I presume is taken from Edward Gibbon's tome, led me to believe that it would be a pompous prequel to Brideshead Revisited. And its lampooning is remarkably fresh, if one ignores the use of the words Negroes, coons and chinks (all in the same paragraph) while racism is being satirised.

I learn that a television series is to be made in the near future. I can't wake to see what is made of this wonderful book!

I agree with Pip, This was a delight to read- funny and light, while skewering so many things at once. And still relevant!
I'm still chuckling about several things- some of which I shouldn't be proud to laugh about...
4.5 stars.

Decline and Fall by Evelyn Waugh
3/5 stars

With a title like Decline and Fall you know you are in for a wild ride. My copy of the book included an introduction by Frank Kermode which I enjoyed. He referenced Voltaire's Candide which I just read this year so I knew what to expect. Paul Pennyfeather's time at a boys boarding school included a host of characters which was great fun. With the introduction of Margot Beste-Chetwynde in part two I started to lose a little interest, I did not find the relationship believable. When I read this, “From the point of view of this story Paul's second disappearance is necessary, because as the reader will probably have discerned already, Paul Pennyfeather would never have made a hero, and the only interest about him arises from the unusual series of events of which his shadow was witness.” I knew it was down hill from there.

3 Stars from me

There were parts of this story that made me smile to myself, however I did find the book dated and a lot of the story was unbelievable nonsense.

That said it was a quick, fun read.

I agree with Pip and Tracy, though I wonder if Pip has a bowdlerized version as in the edition I got from the library, there is a note that a few minor changes were made at the insistence of the editor to get the original published (he specifically references a change in the stationmaster from selling his sister to his sister-in-law, which was apparently seen as less shocking) and that he had reverted them all back to the original. Rather than Negro in the section that Pip refers to he uses the word "nigger." as Pip notes, Waugh uses this (and references to Jews, etc.) to lampoon the corrupt society of cheats and frauds who look down on Blacks (and other non- (or insufficiently) English) as uncivilized.

I also give this 4 stars, but I am still thinking on it and may bump it to 5.

Decline and Fall by Evelyn Waugh
4 stars

This was such a unusual book, nothing at all like I thought it would be. A young man, Paul Pennyfeather, is in school studying to enter the ministry. One night as he's crossing the campus he's accosted by some other students looking to cause trouble. They steal his clothes and because he runs back to us dorm unclothed, he ends up being expelled for indecent behaviour. And so begins the steady decline and fall of Mr. Pennyfeather's life. Just a strangely funny account of how this naive young man, and some of his acquaintances, run into one stumbling block after another just trying to get through life.

I know this book is meant to be funny, and some scenes were. Overall though I was rather bored by this novel. Paul is so gullible, and otherwise so flat a character that I really didn't care what happened to him. Maybe I'll reread this one in a few years, in case 2020 has just not put me in quite the right mood to appreciate this book. For now though, I gave this book 4 stars. Waugh writes well enough, and I know my sister loved this book, but this is definitely not my favorite Waugh novel so far.

Reason read: TBR takedown, Reading 1001
This is the first published, therefore debut novel for Evelyn Waugh and is based on the author’s own experience with academia. The main character Paul Pennyfeather is expelled after running through campus without his trousers. He loses his guardian’s support and is forced to find employment. Employment leads to North Wales which then leads to falling in love and a proposal to marry. The marriage is halted by the arrest, conviction, and incarceration of Paul. In the end, all things end where they started. The author wanted that the reader should know “IT IS MEANT TO BE FUNNY”. Themes include cultural confusion, moral disorientation, and social bedlam.

A fun read with interesting satire of the English class structure, educational system, prison reform, and all sorts of manifestations of the English male. The overall theme seemed to be about the breakdown of values across all societal levels. Many of the secondary characters have a persuasive charm but our Primary Character, Paul, is rather dull and flat and, as our author comes right out and says, is just there to have things happen to him.
I was expecting something quite a bit more ponderous so I was happy to have this be so light. However, I gave it only three stars.

This was amusing enough. It often seems like Waugh is trying to imitate P.G. Wodehouse, and he doesn’t measure up in my humble opinion. The audiobook is severely annotated so I ended up reading the book anyway, but the narrator, Rik Mayall (of The Young Ones fame) is simply brilliant.

⭐⭐⭐

***

Oh dear, this was quite different from the other Waughs on the List. This is a biting, farcical satire mimicking in some respects Waugh's situation when he wrote this novel. Even though this was quite funny at times, it was also unbelievably nonsensical in large chunks; the peregrinations of Paul Pennyfeather from Oxford to jail via a school in Welsh backwaters and a high-society dalliance bear more the hallmarks of a spoof than the more subtle satire from his later novels. The novel in its tone and structure would rather fit the 60s and the 70s than the 20s of its origins. Not my favourite of his, but nonetheless funnily readable.

A bit broad for my tastes, the disastrous but strangely blessed career of a male ingenue who gets manipulated by everyone but slides along anyway, charming people (with one word sentences) by being a still reflecting pool to charm themselves, and ending up with a kind of zen-like acceptance of himself after a rebirth of sorts. But since he is so static and we don't get growth or thinking on his part, just a steady slide down to this place of rest, it feels like a shut out the wicked world kind of conclusion, which in this time in particular, does not strike me as the right answer.