Understanding Beryl Bainbridge PDF Download

Author: Brett Josef Grubisic
Publisher: Univ of South Carolina Press
ISBN: 9781570037566
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 212

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Book Description
"In this introduction to prolific British novelist Beryl Bainbridge, Brett Josef Grubisic provides a biographical sketch of the writer, discussion of her motivations and techniques, and a detailed survey of her fiction that places the works in the traditions of British black comedy, social novels, and historical fiction. In approaching her works, Grubisic maps Bainbridge's movement from social to historical novels, beginning with the comic historicism of Young Adolf and continuing to her most recent fiction, The Birthday Boys, Every Man for Himself, Master Georgie, and According to Queeney. Grubisic holds that in portraying historical events through a variety of narrative techniques or from oblique vantage points, Bainbridge's latest novels partially ally themselves with the style and ideological concerns of literary postmodernism while still recalling the defining view of hardship established in her youth."--BOOK JACKET.

Author: Brendan King
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1472908546
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 577

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Book Description
Dame Beryl Bainbridge was one of the most popular and recognisable English novelists of her generation. She was shortlisted for the Booker Prize five times, and her critically acclaimed novels The Dressmaker (1973), The Bottle Factory Outing (1974), An Awfully Big Adventure (1990), Every Man For Himself (1996) and Master Georgie (1998), confirmed her status as one of the major literary figures of the past fifty years. A unique voice in fiction, and unforgettable in person, Beryl Bainbridge was famous for her gregarious drinking habits and her unconventional lifestyle. Yet underneath the public image of a quirky eccentric lay a complex and sometimes traumatic private life that she rarely talked about and which was often only hinted at in her novels. In this first full-length biography, Brendan King draws on a mass of unpublished letters and diaries to reveal the real woman behind the popular image. He explores Bainbridge's difficult childhood in Formby, her career as a young actress at the Liverpool Playhouse, and her life as a single mother and writer in Camden Town. Along the way he tackles her complex private life: her failed marriage to the painter Austin Davies, her affairs, and her longstanding relationship with her publisher, Colin Haycraft. This frank portrait of Beryl Bainbridge tells the story of a life that is every bit as dramatic and compelling as one of her own perfectly-crafted novels.

Author: Beryl Bainbridge
Publisher: Abacus
ISBN: 0748125744
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 118

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Book Description
Short-listed for the Booker Prize and named 'one of the greatest novels of all time' by The Observer, this riveting novel shows Beryl Bainbridge at her darkly comic best. Freda and Brenda spend their days working in an Italian-run wine-bottling factory. A work outing offers promise for Freda and terror from Brenda; passions run high on that chilly day of freedom, and life after the outing never returns to normal. Inspired by author Beryl Bainbridge's own experiences working at a London wine-factory in the 1970s, The Bottle Factory Outing examines issues of friendship and consent, making the novel timelier than ever. Readers will be dazzled by this offbeat, haunting yet hilarious Guardian fiction prize-winning novel. 'An outrageously funny and horrifying story' Graham Greene (Observer)

Author: Beryl Bainbridge
Publisher: Hachette UK
ISBN: 0748125248
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 161

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'A stellar literary event . . . written with panache and an enviable economy . . . the biggest risk of her literary life' Margaret Atwood According to Queeney is a masterly evocation of the last years of Dr Johnson, arguably Britain's greatest Man of Letters. The time is the 1770s and 1780s and Johnson, having completed his life's major work (he compiled the first ever Dictionary of the English Language) is running an increasingly chaotic life. Torn between his strict morality and his undeclared passion for Mrs Thrale, the wife of an old friend, According to Queeney reveals one of Britain's most wonderful characters in all his wit and glory. Above all, though, this is a story of love and friendship and brilliantly narrated by Queeney, Mrs Thrale's daughter, looking back over her life.

Author: Beryl Bainbridge
Publisher: Open Road Media
ISBN: 1504039912
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 130

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The tragicomic tale of a dysfunctional middle-class family in postwar England from the award-winning author of Injury Time. Though the Second World War has ended, times are anything but peaceful for seventeen-year-old Alan. His father, an entrepreneur who was once able to provide the family with a comfortable life, is now struggling to put food on the table. Meanwhile, Alan’s mother dresses as if money is plentiful and spends all her time avoiding her husband, indulging in the escapism of romance novels, and engaging in real-world love affairs. And as if a household struck by poverty and marital trouble isn’t enough, Alan’s bohemian sister, Madge, has been sneaking off into the sand dunes for lusty rendezvous with a German POW. All Alan wants is for his sister to stop cavorting around and driving their father mad—and for a pretty choir girl named Janet to notice him. But the more he wishes for a normal life, the more chaotic it becomes. Everyone in his family is hiding something, not only from one another but also from themselves. And they’re all desperately clinging to something that is inevitably falling apart. Award-winning British author Beryl Bainbridge has a keen eye for the dark humor that lurks in misery and a knack for illuminating the emotional rubble of postwar England. A Quiet Life is an entertaining family drama that is at once a quick read and a lasting portrait of twentieth-century life.

Author: Beryl Bainbridge
Publisher: Open Road Media
ISBN: 1504039408
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 129

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Winner of the Whitbread Literary Award: A darkly humorous tale about a 1970s dinner party gone terribly wrong by one of Britain’s most renowned authors. Edward is normally a cautious man, especially when it comes to his mistress, Binny. But he feels bad that his lover never gets to enjoy the small intimacies of marriage, like sorting his socks or picking out gifts for his family. It is out of this guilt that Edward agrees to throw a dinner party with his “real friends” so Binny can feel more involved in his life and play hostess for a night. But there’s one catch: Edward has to be home no later than eleven to keep his wife from discovering his infidelity. The invitees to the secret soiree are a discreet couple: Simpson, an aspiring adulterer himself, and Muriel, a simultaneously disapproving and open-minded housewife. But as Binny haphazardly prepares the food, shoos her children out for the night, and frets about the aesthetics of her front lawn, the guests take an unintended detour through her run-down neighborhood. Edward, meanwhile, is silently panicking—and drinking. Simpson and Muriel finally arrive, and when everyone sits down to eat, it’s already a quarter past nine. Things get off to a decent, if awkward, start, until there’s a loud knock at the door. It’s Binny’s scandalously drunk old friend, Alma, who proceeds to vomit and pass out. But what should be the end of the evening is only the beginning. More unexpected guests arrive—this time it’s bank robbers with sawed-off shotguns. What follows is a chaotic and hilarious series of events, replete with a fake ping-pong match, a baby carriage full of cash, and a delirious getaway. Edward soon begins to worry less about getting home on time, and more about making it home at all. Equal parts dark comedy and thriller, Injury Time is a witty take on 1970s social mores by one of the most celebrated British authors, Beryl Bainbridge, who was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize five times. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Beryl Bainbridge including rare images from the author’s estate.

Author: Beryl Bainbridge
Publisher: Hachette UK
ISBN: 0748125256
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 124

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A brilliantly realized evocation of the thoughts and voices of Captain Scott and the four men with him, who suffered extraordinary hardships before finally dying during their 1912 attempt to be the first to reach the South Pole. 'Bainbridge's account of the horribly familiar story is both fresh and sure-footed. The power of her imagination, her clarity of expression and mastery of language are more striking than anything else I have read this year' Jane Shilling, Sunday Telegraph The Birthday Boys is one of Beryl Bainbridge's most acclaimed novels, telling the story of Scott's doomed expedition through the voices of five men on the voyage. As Scott, Petty Officer Taff Evans, ship's doctor Dr Edward Wilson, Lieutenant Henry Bowers and Captain Lawrence Oates step forward for their place in the narrative, the reader is gripped by the the characters themselves alongside the vividly evoked period.

Author: Beryl Bainbridge
Publisher: Open Road Media
ISBN: 1504039939
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 128

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A satirical thriller about a British adulterer in Russia from the award-winning author of The Bottle Factory Outing. Middle-class, middle-aged, and middle-of-the-road lawyer Douglas Ashburner has never been much of a womanizer. So when he tells his wife he’s going on a fishing holiday, she takes his word for it. But instead of leaving London for Scotland, he departs from Heathrow to Moscow. Douglas is tagging along with his mistress, a sculptor named Nina St. Clair, on a tour of Russia arranged by the Soviet Artists’ Union. Accompanying them on the trip are two other artists: the impudent Bernard Douglas and the irritable Enid Dwyer. Once in Moscow, Ashburner starts to wish he really had gone fishing. He promptly loses his luggage, the food is terrible, the art is horrific, and their tour guide is downright militant. But when Nina slips out to a last-minute lunch appointment and never returns, things go from bad to disastrous. Motives are unclear. Identities are mistaken. And as the group travels from the capital to Lenigrad to Tblisi, confusion, contradictions, and even hallucinations abound. Ripe with the scathing wit, eccentric characters, and richly morbid atmosphere that have earned award-winning author Beryl Bainbridge both a cult following and mainstream praise, Winter Garden is a psychological thriller that turns an ironic lens on the social mores of modern life.

Author: Beryl Bainbridge
Publisher: Abacus
ISBN: 0748125264
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 145

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'This is one of Bainbridge's best books. The close observation and hilarity are underlain by a sense of tragedy as deep as any in fiction' The Times SHORTLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE IN 1990 It is 1950 and the Liverpool repertory theatre company is rehearsing its Christmas production of Peter Pan, a story of childhood innocence and loss. Stella has been taken on as assistant stage manager and quickly becomes obsessed with Meredith, the dissolute director. But it is only when the celebrated O'Hara arrives to take the lead, that a different drama unfolds. In it, he and Stella are bound together in a past that neither dares to interpret.

Author: Beryl Bainbridge
Publisher: Little Brown
ISBN: 9780349111698
Category : British
Languages : en
Pages : 212

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Book Description
SHORTLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE 1998 SHORTLISTED FOR THE GUARDIAN FICTION PRIZE WINNER OF THE JAMES TAIT MEMORIAL PRIZE FOR FICTION WINNER OF THE WH SMITH BOOK OF THE YEAR AWARD When Master Georgie - George Hardy, surgeon and photographer - sets off from the cold squalor of Victorian Liverpool for the heat and glitter of the Bosphorus to offer his services in the Crimea, there straggles behind him a small caravan of devoted followers; Myrtle, his adoring adoptive sister; lapsed geologist Dr Potter; and photographer's assistant and sometime fire-eater Pompey Jones, all of them driven onwards through a rising tide of death and disease by a shared and mysterious guilt. Combining a breathtaking eye for beauty with a visceral understanding of mortality, Beryl Bainbridge exposes her enigmatic hero as tenderly and unsparingly as she reveals the filth and misery of war, and creates a novel of luminous depth and extraordinary intensity.