A "lavishly entertaining" (Publishers Weekly) distillation of Waugh's genius--abundant evidence that one of the twentieth century's most admired and enjoyed English novelists was also a master of the short form.
Evelyn Waugh's short fiction reveals in miniaturized perfection the elements that made him the greatest satirist of the twentieth century. The stories collected here range from delightfully barbed portraits of the British upper classes to an alternative ending to Waugh's novel A Handful of Dust; from a "missing chapter" in the life of Charles Ryder, the nostalgic hero of Brideshead Revisited, to a plot-packed morality tale that Waugh composed at a very tender age; from an epistolary lark in the voice of "a young lady of leisure" to a darkly comic tale of scandal in a remote (and imaginary) African outpost.
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"Just a little quick something for the break room - although the first one was kinda depressing. but I hear that hoity-toity accent in my head and it makes me giggle!" — Coki (4 out of 5 stars)
"Just a little quick something for the break room - although the first one was kinda depressing. but I hear that hoity-toity accent in my head and it makes me giggle!"
“An acute, affectionate interpretive biography.”
“A concise, readable piece of Waugh scholarship that deserves a place in all library collections; highly recommended.”
“Although not really known as a short-story writer, this first-time gathering of his work in that form is incontrovertible evidence of his short-story writing ability. These thirty-nine stories span Waugh’s writing career, and to a one they demonstrate his trademark wit and sophistication.”
“Terrifically good, witty and wild.”
“A tremendous amount of fun...I now know Waugh to be a brilliantly funny writer, a man with a sharp eye and an understated dry wit that never grates or appears senselessly mean, even as he skewers the mores of Edwardian and mid-century England...Waugh is a great discovery for the uninitiated.”
“Waugh was incapable of writing a dull sentence, and he was an absolute genius at contriving sudden dramatic reversals—the butler who turns out to be the duke himself. If you delight in droll syntax and side-splitting caricature, and if you despise these same forms of social misbehavior that Waugh did, then these stories will be your cup of tea.”
“Waugh was the best...beyond much doubt, the greatest satirical novelist of the twentieth century...All the readers who became addicted to Waugh through his novels will find plenty to delight them in...Complete Stories.”
“Thoroughly enjoyable.”
“Wicked wit abounds in The Complete Stories of Evelyn Waugh.”
“A necessary purchase...You emerge braced and bolstered, as if by a cold shower and a cocktail...That Waugh enriched us with the unalloyed gleam of his of his prose—far purer than any of his leaden imitators manage—is now beyond debate.”
“Waugh is so adept at punchy openings, deadpan zingers, and wickedly ironic situations, and so graceful is his use of language, that this volume should serve, at a time of renewed interest in the short story, as primer on the infinite possibilities of the form.”
" It's not Brideshead Revisited. Which shouldn't be a count against it any more than it's account against any book that isn't Brideshead Revisited, and yet somehow it is. "
" I read "Mr. Loveday's Little Outing" when I need a lift or when I have had to grade too many bad student essays. "
" I do enjoy the humour... couldn't relate to the British schoolboy stuff. Do like his novels... "
" Evelyn Waugh remains one of my favorite authors. His stories are so funny, so bitter, and so sad. "
" Oh my Evelyn "
" It was okay. I may go back to it, but only if I need to. "
" these little, brown anthologies are fancy-looking. "
" A bit tedious. Lots of "Charles knew" narration. Finished it and thought, why? "
" Slightly disillusioned yet light and fun. "
Evelyn Waugh (1903–1966) was born October 28, 1903 in London, England. After short periods as an art student and schoolmaster, he devoted himself to travel and to the writing of novels. His novels are unusually highly wrought and precisely written. Those written before 1939 may be described as satirical. During World War II his writing took a more serious and ambitious turn. Waugh also wrote travel books.
Simon Prebble, a British-born performer, is a stage and television actor and veteran narrator of some three hundred audiobooks. As one of AudioFile’s Golden Voices, he has received thirty-seven Earphones Awards and won the prestigious Audie in 2010. He lives in New York.
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