July 2019 book review

THE FATAL ENGLISHMAN, by Sebastian Foulks
Being three brief lives of Englishmen whose lives were cut short in their prime, their perhaps enormous potential never realized. Faulks’s book begins with the story of Christopher (“Kit”) Wood, who threatened at one point to be Britain’s foremost painter of the 20th century before opium and inner demons swept him away, in his case under the wheels of a train. No less a figure than Picasso saw his pictures when he was living in Paris in the years before the Great War, and surprising for a man more used to damning with faint praise, told Wood he had a touch of greatness about him.
             Unfortunately, he also got caught up with a playboy count who liked to smoke opium, and decided to travel around Europe in luxury with him rather than concentrate on his art. A series of women tried to save him, but it was a task doomed to failure. Only a few paintings survive (some of which are illustrated in the book), but it is clear from them that Wood had indeed discovered something new, something unique. Had he lived, he might have eclipsed Augustus John, but fate determined a different path...
            Faulks’s next portrait is of Richard Hillary, who as a Spitfire pilot in the Battle of Britain was shot down, surviving but horribly burned in the process. He went on to write one of the key books of WW2, The Last Battle, which chronicles his slow, agonising recovery. But he too had some kind of death wish and pulled every string he knew to get back into the air. But perhaps I shouldn’t spoil this story...
           Finally, Faulks turns to Jeremy Wolfenden, a man once described as ‘the cleverest young man in England’. At Eton he finished top of year apparently without any effort on his part, and the same thing happened at Oxford. But Wolfenden was gay in an era when that was a crime, not that that prevented him flaunting his sexuality in sometimes outrageous fashion. But his life took a radical new direction when he was recruited by MI6 and sent to Moscow, where the KGB soon heard about him and tried to turn him for their own purposes. Once again I shouldn’t spoil the story, but here again we see how a great future was blighted by inner demons, and in particular in Wolfenden’s case, alcohol.
           Sebastian Faulks is a fine writer of nonfiction and tells his stories with considerable compassion and insight. Highly recommended.

THE CHARTERHOUSE OF PARMA, by Stendhal.
A young man in a hurry would fight for his beloved Napoleon, but his first battle is Napoleon’s last: Waterloo. Fabrice, for lo that is his name, then finds himself in the complex political jigsaw that was northern Italy in the early 19th century. A good-looking young fellow, he is favoured by various well placed and gorgeous ladies, one of whom is his aunt. Are her intentions towards him entirely honourable? Even he is not completely sure, and she’s far too intelligent to reveal her hand until she’s ready. Then he manages to upset the prince of Parma, who, exercising his absolute power, imprisons him in the impregnable Farnese Tower. But even there he finds another beautiful woman to comfort him, albeit at a distance. Can she somehow help him to escape from a prison cell no one has escaped from before? Read on...
            Stendhal is best known for just 2 books, this one and The Scarlet and the Black. Each book has its adherents, but regardless of which they believe is the greater of the two, all are agreed they represent two of the finest novels of the 19th century. They both read like contemporary thrillers, and both demonstrate a deep understanding of the human soul. Read ‘em both, I say.

THE JOY LUCK CLUB, by Amy Tan.
Every week a group of four Chinese ladies in San Francisco get together to play Mah Jong and reminisce. The stories they tell are often of their old life in the home country, and are redolent of the exploitation they experienced at the hands of a patriarchal society and their menfolk in particular. Each has a daughter, and they too are given the opportunity to tell their stories, in their case of their lives in the Land of the Free. Four mothers, four daughters, their stories interweave like a game of Mah Jong (which was the author’s clever design) and in the process we gain a very special insight into the Chinese mind - not so different from ours in its fundamentals: they want to prosper, do better than their ancestors, and find some happiness along the way. If they can...
          A fascinating little book, well written and containing a host of intriguing, and sometimes heartbreaking tales.