No comments about Secret Memoirs of Catherine II and the Court of St. Petersburg: During Her Reign and that of Paul I, by one of her Courtiers.

No comments about Scarlet Boy.

4 comments about Charleston: A Bloomsbury House and Garden.

1. i stumbled across this book on a beautiful indian summer sunday afternoon....it is a treasure for those unable to physically saunter through the rooms and out to the walled garden that is charleston. all photos in colour, all rooms as they were when vanessa bell, duncan grant, family and friends lived and worked there. inspirational.



2. I agree with the previous reader, this is it ... the definitive book on Charleston Farmhouse. Although I think this book is more than a glimpse of the house and garden for those unable to visit, it is a surperb reference for those of us that have visited and wish to recall the house, etc. The photography is stunning, the text is informative. A worthwhile addition to any Bloomsbury book collection.



3. For this genre of books, 5 stars. A nice gift for a Bloomsbury fan, but it is only "nice-to-have," not required for one's library.



4. As far I can say, this is one of the most charming and beautiful houses in the world. Is not that this is house is grant, or magnificent; Charleston is so special, because it's got character and lots of personality. I love this book.

No comments about Winston Churchill and Emery Reves: Correspondence, 1937-1964.

No comments about Pathfinder.

1 comments about The Wordsworth Book of the Kings & Queens of Britain (Wordsworth Reference) (Wordsworth Reference).

1. This particular reference of the Kings and Queens of Britain provides 2-3 page autobiographies of each monarch from a complete chapter dedicated to the Saxon Kings, and from William the Conqueror to George VI. It provides a breakdown of the eight dynasties that has been seated on the throne from 1066 to 1952 along with detailed family trees for each dynasty. The book also provides detailed maps so the reader can get a visual idea of how Britain was created from the Norman Conquest 1067-72, The Dominions of Henry II Plantagenet 1154-89, to the Hundred Years' War, the War of the Roses, and the Civil War. This reference also has a chapter on Irish kings and a chapter on Scotish kings as well. This reference is good for people who just want a little overview of each king or queen of Britain. For anything deeper, I suggest an individual autobiography for each monarch.

No comments about Swift, Volume 2, Dr. Swift (Swift Vol. 2).

No comments about Journals and Debating Speeches (Collected Works of John Stuart Mill).

1 comments about Kevin Myers: From the Irish Times Column 'an Irishmam's Diary'.

1. This is a truly amazing book. Kevin Myers' way with words and knowledge on such a wide variety of topics makes it a delight to read. It's funny, thought-provoking and literary by turns and makes a wonderful companion-piece to his Irish Times column.
   It certainaly proves all of Myers' critics wrong. Brilliant man, brilliant book

2 comments about Dead As Doornails: A Chronicle of Life (Oxford Paperbacks).

1. Cronin gives the reader an enjoyable, sometimes amusing, portrayal of three of of Ireland's greatest modern writers: Brendan Behan, Patrick Kavanagh and Flann O'Brien. His descriptions of pre-fame Brendan Behan are excellent. They show the young and adventurous Behan as he was before fame, drink, and self-parody overtook him. It was somewhat disappointing that Flann O'Brien, author of skilled and imaginative works (At-Swim-Two-Birds, The Third Policeman) was himself an alcoholic with, nonetheless, a bourgeois, sometimes puritanical personality. All these writers (and others everywhere)tended to be petty, egoistic, and hyper-critical, especially about their contemporaries' work. But this does not make them uninteresting, and one should always separate art from artist.



2. My subject line quotes Cronin, and serves as a summary of his devastating portrayal of the sadness beneath the frolicking attributed and appropriated by Brendan Behan for much of this narrative. Reading this in tandem with John Ryan's "Remembering How We Stood," it's instructive to find how much the two memoirs of bohemian, post-war Dublin overlap yet each keeps its own particular focus separate even as they cover so many similar events: Behan's self-promotion, Kavanagh's libel litigation, and Flann O'Brien's insular inspiration. The Scots painters "The Roberts" receive greater detail here than in Ryan, as he knows them in London and follows their troubled relationship further. Likewise, Cronin provides a pre-fame Behan in all his exasperating energy as the two bum about France. Ryan keeps his attention on the Dublin setting from which he witnessed the literati's coming and going; Cronin brings in the Continent and Britain to widen the perspective, often offering greater detail if no less a careful analysis than Ryan. As a fellow writer, Cronin--unlike the publican/editor of Envoy Ryan--was seen by Kavanagh especially as competition, and this intensity adds dynamism to Cronin's descriptions of his conniving compatriots.
   
   Certainly there is humor, but more profoundly, melancholy. Drink, sexual repression and expression, and the limitations of what Ireland could offer talented writers in this repressed era makes for cautionary tales about how short-lived fame can be and how crippling it can be for those whose lives outlast their genius. Cronin's briefer, later encounters with his subjects after they have fallen from the heights gain poignancy even as he refuses to sentimentalise his (former) friends, since they too often all too easily refuse to take blame for their own fate.
   
   When I read about Julian Mclaren-Ross, I figured this minor figure was popular in the Edwardian period; when Cronin reveals that this once-recognised author was then--deep in decline--only in his forties, it only underscored the brevity of renown and the long slide afterwards so many must endure from the creative ranks. Cronin writes precisely, without cliche, self-pity, or cruelty. Along with Ryan, Cronin's non-autobiographical (!) memoir marks a celebration and an epitaph for 1945-55, more or less, among a coterie who sabotaged their own potential--even as they tried to achieve more than their society dared allow for them.
   
   (Cronin's fictionalisation, Life of Riley, on this period is also worth reading, as are his incisive biographies of Flann O'Brien and--a figure curiously absent from Dead as Doornails even in an aside--Samuel Beckett.)