The Old Devils - Kingsley Amis

The Odyssey - Homer

Around the 8th century BC, the inhabitants of Greece began to write things down. Amongst these were some of the poems telling of ancient times which bards had passed from generation to generation, and the greatest of these poems were the Iliad and the Odyssey. The Odyssey tells of the adventures of one of the Greek heroes, Odysseus, as he returned to his home in Ithaca from the Trojan War. His journey took 10 years, and included adventures which are famous to this day, including his encounter with the one-eyed Cyclops, and negotiating the twin dangers of Scylla and Charybdis. When he finally reaches Ithaca, he has to deal with the suitors who are occupying his palace and trying to persuade his wife Penelope that he is dead and that she should marry one of them. Attributed to a man called Homer, the true authorship of the work is unknown. But it asks questions which resonate with us now. What is home? What is a hero, and how should men behave? Why is the journey itself so important? What makes a great leader? How does a son find his own identity when he has a powerful father? Is adultery justifiable? How should you behave towards strangers? Told in beautiful poetry, the descriptions of Odysseus and his men sailing across the wine dark sea haunt our imaginations today as they would have done for the Greeks who heard these stories so many centuries ago. Join Rupert and Charlie as they look at this extraordinary and magnificent work of literature, which has influenced almost every great writer since, and which is the first expression of the western consciousness that we have.

The Old Devils - Kingsley Amis

By the mid 1980s, Kingsley Amis was generally considered to be finished as a novelist. Devastated by the collapse of his marriage to Elizabeth Jane Howard, he was hugely overweight, drinking far too much and renting a basement flat from his first wife and her third husband. But in 1986, he published what his son Martin regarded as his masterpiece, The Old Devils, which won the Booker Prize. Set in the south Wales in which he had spent the first 15 years of his professional life, it follows the lives of several couples who have known each other since childhood and are now in their 60s. Their world is thrown into turmoil by the return from London of Alan Weaver and his beautiful wife Rhiannon.  Alan is a minor TV celebrity who has built a career on being a professional Welshman; on his return, old relationships are rekindled and long dormant affairs restarted. In a haze of alcohol and cigarettes, Amis portrays the reality of physical decline, the pathos of remembering past and lost love, and the sense of imminent death with humour and sensitivity.  His satire of Welsh nationalism and the excesses of Welsh cultural figures like Dylan Thomas is merciless, and yet there is a warmth and tenderness in his descriptions of characters with whom he shared so many physical and emotional qualities. Join Rupert and Charlie as they discuss this fine novel, which was the start of a late renaissance for Amis’ career.

A Passage to India - E.M. Forster

What really happened in the Marabar Caves? This is the central mystery of A Passage to India, EM Forster’s most celebrated novel, set in colonial India in the early 20th century. An Indian doctor, Aziz, wants to show some English visitors the real India, and takes them on an expedition to the strange caves which are a short trainride from the city of Chandrapore. He goes into one of the caves with Adela Quested, a young woman recently arrived from England. But Adela suddenly flees from the cave and accuses Aziz of attempting to rape her. The incident creates a crisis between the communities, and forces the central characters to confront existential issues about themselves and their lives. Forster explores the relationship between the career soldiers and administrators who nominally run India, and the various classes of Indians, and through this prism asks some fundamental questions: what is the nature of friendship? Can it transcend racial divides? What is the real India? And how do characters like Mrs Moore cope when everything they have believed in sems suddenly worthless? Forster never wrote another novel after this one, although he lived for nearly 50 more years. Join Rupert and Charlie as they discuss this most subtle and sensitive of writers.

The Quiet American - Graham Greene

Graham Greene’s novel The Quiet American is set in Vietnam in the 1950s – the French are trying to hold on to colonial power and are supporting the south in its struggle against a communist insurgency in the north. America is not yet involved militarily but is taking an interest. The novel tells the story of an American agent called Pyle who is supplying advice and explosives to a shadowy group who he believes can provide a “Third Way” for the country. Pyle meets a British journalist, Fowler, and it is through Fowler’s eyes that the story unfolds. His voice is to a large extent Greene’s voice – jaded, cynical and weary, but he retains the capacity for love and hope. He has a beautiful Vietnamese girlfriend called Phoung, who the idealistic Pyle falls in love with. How does this triangle play out? Who is Pyle really and what is he trying to achieve? Why doesn’t Fowler want to go home? And how does Greene’s Catholicism play out in the entangled lives of these three characters? Join Charlie and Rupert as they discuss this most subtle and nuanced of novels by one of the masters of 20th century British fiction.

Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh - Part 2

At Book In, we continue our discussion of Evelyn Waugh’s wonderful novel Brideshead Revisited. We look at the characters of the Marchmain family - the children Sebastian, Julia, Bridey and Cordelia, and the parents, Lord and Lady Marchmain, and at how Charles Ryder interacts with them, and we also talk about the extraordinary creation of Anthony Blanche who is so important both as a friend of Sebastian and as a commentator on the Flyte family. And we look at the humour in the book - as always, Waugh is a brilliantly writer and the scenes with Charles and his father are amongst the funniest he wrote. Why do the Flytes all fall in love with the slightly dull and passive figure of Charles? Why does Julia fall in love with the brash, heartless Rex Mottram? Why does Lord Marchmain come back to Brideshead to die? And does the 1981 TV series of the book stand up today? Join Rupert and Charlie on Book In to find out.