The Emperor Waltz

by Philip Hensher

The new novel from Booker Prize-shortlisted Philip Hensher is his most ambitious and daring novel yet.

In a third-century desert settlement on the fringes of the Roman Empire, a new wife becomes fascinated by a cult that is persecuted by the Emperor Diocletian. In 1922, Christian, a young artist, travels to Weimar to begin his studies at the Bauhaus, where the avant-garde confronts conservative elements around it. With postwar Germany in turmoil, while the Bauhaus attempts to explore radical ways of thinking and living, Christian finds that love will change him for ever. And in 1970s London Duncan uses his inheritance to establish the country’s first gay bookshop in the face of opposition from the neighbours and victimisation by the police.

Delving deep into the human spirit to explore connections between love, sanctity, commitment and virtue, Philip Hensher takes as his subject small groups of men and women, tightly bound together, trying to change the world through the example of their lives. The Emperor Waltz is an absorbing echo-chamber of a novel, innovative and compelling, that explores what it means for us to belong to each other.

Genres: Historical Fiction, Fiction, Historical, LGBT, Germany, British Literature, Literary Fiction

624 pages, Hardcover

First published July 3, 2014

About the author

Hensher was born in South London, although he spent the majority of his childhood and adolescence in Sheffield, attending Tapton School.[2] He did his undergraduate degree at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford before attending Cambridge, where he was awarded a PhD for work on 18th century painting and satire. Early in his career he worked as a clerk in the House of Commons, from which he was fired over the content of an interview he gave to a gay magazine.[1] He has published a number of novels, is a regular contributor, columnist and book reviewer for newspapers and weeklies such as The Guardian, The Spectator , The Mail on Sunday and The Independent.
The Bedroom of the Mister’s Wife (1999) brings together 14 of his stories, including ‘Dead Languages’, which A. S. Byatt selected for her Oxford Book of English Short Stories (1998), making Hensher the youngest author included in the anthology.http://literature.britishcouncil.org/...
Since 2005 he has taught creative writing at the University of Exeter. He has edited new editions of numerous classic works of English Literature, such as those by Charles Dickens and Nancy Mitford, and Hensher served as a judge for the Booker Prize. From 2013 he will hold the post of Professor of Creative Writing at Bath Spa University.[3]
Since 2000, Philip Hensher has been listed as one of the 100 most influential LGBT people in Britain,[4] and in 2003 as one of Granta's twenty Best of Young British Novelists.[1]
In 2008, Hensher's semi-autobiographical novel The Northern Clemency was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize. In 2012, Hensher won first prize -German Travel Writers Award, and is shortlisted for the Green Carnation Prize. He also won the Stonewall Prize for the Journalist of the Year in 2007 and The Somerset Maugham Award for his novel Kitchen Venom in 1996. He wrote the libretto for Thomas Adès' 1995 opera Powder Her Face. This has been his only musical collaboration to date.
His early writings have been characterized as having an "ironic, knowing distance from their characters" and "icily precise skewerings of pretension and hypocrisy"[1] His historical novel The Mulberry Empire "echos with the rhythm and language of folk tales" while "play[ing] games" with narrative forms.[1]
He is married to Zaved Mahmood, a human rights lawyer at the United Nations.

You can find out more about Philip on his author page at 4th Estate Books: http://www.4thestate.co.uk/author/phi...

Reviews

[Maya Panika · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another weighty tome from the wonderful Philip Hensher. Three stories stand side by side: the birth of Christianity in a third-century Roman provincial town; post-Great War Germany, the Bauhaus, the Weimar republic and the growing power of Nazism; 1980s London, where a young man opens London's first a gay bookshop, just as a mysterious new disease seems to be spreading through the community.
This is a book about outsiders, small groups of individuals determined to be themselves, who pitch themselves against society's norms and march to their own beat in the face of fear, prejudice and persecution, and in so doing, change their worlds. Other than that, there's not much that connects the threads - only occasionally, something: an object, a word, an idea; like The Emperor Waltz itself, originally titled 'Hand in Hand' and written as a ' toast of friendship' between Austria and Germany. Or like the blackbirds of this story: Druidic legend tells of three blackbirds which sing in the World Trees of other worlds to impart mystic secrets. There were many such small metaphors, mentioned only in passing, which brush across the narrative lines, light as a butterfly's wing and each one - when recognised; I'm sure I missed most - was a delight.
Philip Hensher has a marvellous ear for language and dialogue, a wonderful eye for everyday details. The guys of the gay bookshop were my favourites, their chapters were frequently laugh out loud funny, but also deeply touching. The thing as a whole is deliciously readable, written in an easy, smoothly passionate style. 615 pages - what a formidable brick of a book it seemed when it arrived, but I was through them all in no time and so sorry when I was done.

[Gerhard · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is only the second Philip Hensher novel I have read, after King of the Badgers. His latest, The Friendly Ones, is also on my reading radar. Hensher is an interesting and eclectic writer more than likely to lure one to his back list once you have read one of his books.

What attracted me to The Emperor Waltz the most, I think, was the fact that it includes an array of eras and time periods, from the Roman Empire to the 1920s and the 1970s to the mid-1980s.

What narrative glue would Hensher use to bind all these disparate strands together? This is exactly where the novel fails, I think. The individual sections just do not cohere. Also, some are definitely more interesting than others, which makes the read a strange combination of slog and anticipation.

While the two major storylines are about the Bauhaus movement in the 1920s, and the establishment of London’s first gay bookshop in the 1970s, there are weird interludes like a section where a bunch of teenagers sniff poppers and watch porn while their parents have a dinner party downstairs, another ‘meta’ section where the author inserts himself into the text as a character during an extended hospital stay for a gangrenous toe due to diabetes, and a section where a Roman senator’s wife joins a strange cult and is sentenced to death-by-animal-mauling in the amphitheatre as a result.

Yes, I get that Hensher’s overarching theme is outsiders and how they challenge the status quo, and how ‘like attracts like’ when it comes to both artists and revolutionaries. But there is just not sufficient interstitial connection to link all of this emotionally and thematically.

What there is, though, is Hensher’s superb eye for dialogue and character interaction. The best bits are about the bookshop, which is a neat metaphor for the development of a gay literary canon itself, as well as the so-called ‘gay movement’ (like Bauhaus and the weird cult in the Roman section, which turns out to be Christianity.)

Writing a novel like this one cannot but be beware of the long shadows cast by Edmund White and Alan Hollinghurst, among others. Hensher is quite mischievous in his characters’ assessment of these gay literary luminaries. Indeed, this is a very funny and pointed book at times.

For all its flaws, which probably won’t appear as such to other readers – indeed, a lot of readers will gravitate towards different sections as their personal favourites, I think – this is a formidable novel. Fiercely intelligent and determinedly iconoclastic, Hensher demands a high level of attention and commitment from his readers. The effort is well worth the reward.

[Jennifer (JC-S) · Rating 4 out of 5]

‘We exist in society and we make our own societies as we go.’

In 1889, Johann Strauss II composed the Emperor Waltz (originally called ‘Hand in Hand’) as a symbolic toast to friendship from the Austrian Emperor Franz Josef to the German Kaiser Willhelm II. The waltz was first performed in Berlin on 21 October 1889. It is a beautiful piece of music which, referred to twelve times in the novel, provides one of the leitmotifs in this sprawling novel.

There are a number of different people, settings and stories (divided into books) in this novel. They are, at least in my reading, loosely (but differently) connected. References to the Emperor Waltz link a number of the nine books within the novel, while references to red hair provide a different type of connection between some books, as does a reference to towels and bed linen to a couple of the stories.

The three main stories in the novel are set in Weimar in 1922, involving Christian; in London in the 1980s involving Duncan; and in a Roman city in Africa in 203 CE involving Perpetua, a merchant’s daughter who is put to death for converting to Christianity. There are other stories as well.

How are these very different stories linked? Is this a novel or a collection of loosely linked short stories or novellas? Does it matter?

For me, the novel is thematically connected, but the themes I identified each have a shadow. Belonging, freedom, friendship and joy are the positive themes, countered by alienation, betrayal, capture and sacrifice. Each of the main stories contains both elements, none of the major characters is without flaw, none of the stories satisfyingly complete.

I found it very difficult to put this book down once I started reading it. I kept looking for more substantial links between the different stories, and hoping for different resolutions. In general, I didn’t find what I was looking for, but what I did find was held my attention. And made me wonder about the various ways we identify and choose (or not) our own paths in the world.

Note: my thanks to NetGalley and the publisher Fourth Estate for providing me with a copy of this book.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

[Mark Landmann · Rating 2 out of 5]

Well, it took me a long, long time, but I finally finished it. I wouldn't really recommend it, I'm afraid. After loving "The Northern Clemency" I found this one quite a contrast. Whereas in TNC I found the characters extremely compelling and the dialogue poignant and moving, in this case I can barely remember any of the millions of characters and some of the dialogue seemed almost laughably wooden, especially in the Bauhaus sections. I love it when David Mitchell moves us around between stories and time periods but I just didn't feel like it worked in this book. The Bauhaus sections, while a fascinating idea for a novel, didn't work for me at all... I found them so boring and the characters so listless that I could barely read more than 5 pages at a time. The future section and the Roman Empire sections... WTF??? What point did they serve being there? Must have gone over my head. Hensher does not write concisely, and I loved in in TNC, but here I just had to roll my eyes and just let it go. I wonder how many characters there were in total in the book. I could probably identify about 5-10% if you told me their names now. The only section which I could say I enjoyed, and fortunately it was the main section, was the parts involving the gay bookstore. Even those characters I didn't find entirely convincing. And even here I couldn't keep track of all the characters. And many plot points didn't seem entirely earned or explained. But I wish he'd just written the book in this world with these characters... that seems to me like it could have been more successful.

[Bel · Rating 3 out of 5]

In line with most reviewers of this book, I found it a disappointment after being excited by the fantastic sounding premise. The themes are very subtle, so the supposed interweaving of narratives (which is really two stories told in about 3 parts, with some random interludes in other times and places) doesn't impress. The sections set in 1920s Germany, with Bauhaus and hyperinflation, are strangely emotionless. The Roman section is excellent but too short. The 1980s section, which follows the founding of a gay bookshop not unlike Gay's The Word in London, was far and away the most enjoyable for me, but still lacked any real impact (and seriously Hensher - why the hating on lesbians? It went beyond a stereotypical view of 1980s gay men). The Emperor Waltz did lead to an excellent book club discussion, but without that I would have found it something of a wasted effort for me.

[Tehmina Kazi · Rating 4 out of 5]

I attended a reading of "The Emperor Waltz" at Polari in London last year, which brought the house down! I had to get my hands on a copy, and really enjoyed reading it. The book follows the Bauhaus movement in 1920s Germany (through the eyes of a lawyer's son) and the establishment of a gay bookshop in 1970s London. Interspersed between these two main stories are smaller vignettes, such as an autobiographical excerpt of the author having an infected toe treated in London, and an account of the martyrdom of St Perpetua in 203.

The descriptions are rich and sumptuous, and the characters well-developed. Hensher's observations on human nature are second to none. It is over 600 pages long, but zips along nicely and can be read in a few sittings. The theme that runs through all the stories is that of visionary outsiders trying to make change in their societies, pace by pace, regardless of the personal cost involved. This is something that really resonated with me!

The only reason I haven't given it five stars? I felt there could have been greater links between the different stories, and some of them (e.g. St Perpetua) were less compelling (then again, I am no history buff). But "The Emperor Waltz" is best enjoyed for the sardonic exchanges between the different characters, the reflections on love and belonging, and the wonderful humour that left us all cracking up at the South Bank Centre!

[Andrew Smith · Rating 3 out of 5]

I finished The Emperor Waltz a couple of weeks ago, and at the time I was inclined to rate the book a four-star read, maybe even a five-star. I was dazzled by Hensher's storytelling talent and the vivid, idiosyncratic depictions of his characters. But on reflection I realized that the book made no sense as a cohesive novel. Cleverer readers than I may be able to see links between the distinct sections of the book, but I could see little or no reason to group them together, except as a device to showcase Hensher's impressive writing talents. Rather than an ingenious, continuous narrative designed to pleasure a reader the book is a somewhat egotistical collection of literary pyrotechnic displays. That said, the two main stories are incredibly well crafted, and Hensher's research shines, rather than shows. (Except for his 70s dialogue — speaking as one who was there, nobody I knew talked like that.) The Emperor Waltz is an enjoyable experience, but only as a collection of bravura pieces rather than as the single masterpiece it might at first appear to be.

[Roger Brunyate · Rating 4 out of 5]

Cliques, Cults, and Cataclysms

First, let me try to explain what we have here. The book (I won't call it a novel) consists of nine parts and an epilogue. The two main interwoven strands of three sections each could be viewed as separate novels of 200 pages or so. One of these is set in Germany between 1922 and 1933, the other in London between 1979 and 1998; the epilogue brings both of these to a conclusion of sorts, though in other respects they remain unconnected. In addition, there are three standalone pieces, which are more puzzling. One features a group of young teenagers in an upstairs room in contemporary London, experimenting with drinks and poppers while their parents are having dinner downstairs; their dialogue is so loaded with slang (world like "nang," "wagwarn," and "piff") as to be almost incomprehensible. Another has the author recounting in his own voice a recent stay in a hospital ward next to an Irish wino with poor bowel control. And the third is an account of a Third Century Christian martyr in a Roman colony in North Africa. Five different ingredients at least, with no obvious connection between them other than occasional mention of the Strauss waltz of the title. What is going on?

My guess is that the later of the two longer threads is the key. I surmise that Hensher wanted, primarily, to write about his own subculture: gay men. Perhaps he also wanted to write historically, looking at the period when English gays moved from being an underground culture to a more or less open one. This is already historical fiction; he was born in 1965, so would have only entered the wider gay world in the 1980s, when the transformation was already under way. (There is an analogy here to what he was doing in Scenes from Early Life, writing about the Bangladesh war of independence apparently through the eyes of his husband, Zaved Mahmood, who would similarly only just have been born at the time.) He has a central character, Duncan Flannery, who uses an inheritance from his father to open the first gay bookshop in London. But he needs a background out of which the movement can emerge into relative acceptance. This requires a feat of the imagination. I think he took the more extreme forms of gay behavior as he sees it today, and transposed it to a time when promiscuity and general cattiness was the name of the game, the kind of incivility bred by the then-recent legislation of male homosexuality, but not yet normalized by some measure of acceptance in society. It did not ring true to me because it seemed a caricature, the kind of writing that, from the pen of a straight author, would be condemned as homophobic stereotyping.

But he wants to open it too, make it less parochial. You can almost hear him brainstorming: What other kinds of in-groups are there that have started as off-beat semi-underground movements and have turned around to change society for better or worse? The clandestine early Christians are an obvious choice. The idea of Weimar in 1922 is an inspired one, offering several fanatical groups: art students at the radical Bauhaus, a Hari-Krishna-type subgroup of these (the Mazdaznan) who go about with shaven heads and purple robes, and in the background of course Hitler's Brownshirts. Somewhere along the line, he must also have realized that if everything was going to look like the early Christians—sweetness and light, self-immolation, and the triumph of the good—it would all be pretty sappy. So he decided to put in a dark side. Actually, there is something dark in each thread: the unsympathetic portrayal of Duncan's character in the first part, the storm troopers in Weimar, the incontinent man in the hospital (offsetting an essay that is really about the value of friendship), and the substance-abusing teens. The latter are a closed group too (and how!), with nothing much to be said for them—except that they will eventually grow up and take responsible positions in society. As indeed does Duncan and gay culture generally. Which may be the point.

So if you take the Duncan thread as the main one, and see it as a coming-of-age story (of a movement, not an individual), you can then range all the other elements around it. The obnoxious teens are an analogy to its uncivilized beginning stage. The essay about hospital visitors marks the opposite end: an arrival at human warmth and commitment. The Weimar thread is a complex parallel 50 years earlier. And the early Christian one hangs over the whole as a kind of presiding deity.

Those last two give me pause, however. I felt the story of the young Roman woman who converts to Christianity was just too simple, saying little about the internal dynamics of the conversion experience. And although the bits of the book I actually loved were all in the German thread (especially a brilliant freshman class taught by Paul Klee), I was also disappointed that it was so inconclusive. We know, alas, what happens with the Brownshirts, but the rest of the story goes nowhere much. I wondered, for instance, if we were meant to see Christian Vogt, the young protagonist of this section, as homosexual without knowing it? Yes, he courts the sister of one of his classmates, but it seems mostly a romantic whim. I think if this were a standalone novel (as it almost could have been), he would have had to have done more with it. As it is, we have to be content with the tentative threads we draw between the sections in our own minds.

In a first (and shorter) attempt at this review, I took Hensher to task for perpetrating a mishmash of inconclusive and disconnected parts, as well as for the predominantly nasty tone of much of the London gay story. Thinking about it some more, however, I believe I see the boldness of his experiment and his intent behind it. It does not quite come off, but I am rounding my original three stars up to four.

[Joan Kerr · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ian McEwan recently came under fire in The Guardian for his comment that he often felt the need to use his “blue pencil” on the big books that are being produced today.

He could, perhaps, have been talking about Philip Hensher’s latest, The Emperor Waltz (Fourth Estate, London, 2014). McEwan’s blue pencil might have struck out the entire section dealing with the martyrdom of St Perpetua in 203 and lashed out at the apparently autobiographical section dealing with a stay in hospital for an infected toe.

Martyrdoms and toes aside, the novel swings and swoops from Germany between the wars, the time of monstrous hyperinflation, rising Nazi nationalism with its accompanying anti-semitism, and the artistic revolution symbolised by the Bauhaus, so outrageous to bourgeois sensibilities, to London in the 1970’s where Duncan opens the first gay bookshop in the city with an inheritance from his mean and vindictive old father. Duncan and his out-there friends are an attack on bourgeois morality comparable to the attack of Klee and his Bauhaus colleagues, and they too are under attack, not only from people who spit in their sandwiches and throw bricks through the shop window, but from AIDS. This is the underlying dialogue of the book, between bourgeois morality, ranging from stifling to calculating to vicious, and the extreme personal risk involved in confronting it, between the comfort of fellowship and personal loneliness and deracination. This makes it sound heavy; it’s not, or not often. Hensher is intensely dramatic and often very funny. The book is worth reading for the second section alone, the section dealing with the death of Duncan’s father and the setting-up of the shop.

The serious critics have almost universally admired and even loved the book. The Australian critic Peter Craven goes so far as to compare Hensher to Thomas Mann. Here’s a difference: Thomas Mann’s books aren’t about being Thomas Mann. At its heart, The Emperor Waltz is about being Philip Hensher.

Hensher has talent to burn and gorgeous technique. He is a brilliant and untroubled observer of human behaviour, the brilliance given its edge, as Peter Craven says, by his unusually cold eye. Perhaps it’s this cold eye that gives the book something of a tricksy feel. One of the characters is a master puppet-maker. For all its rich texture, its close observation and its wonderful creation of life’s messy and grand detail, the puppet-maker is always there.

[Mandy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Two points to make first of all. I really enjoyed reading this long, sprawling and ambitious novel. I found it absorbing and entertaining and (most of the time) well written. Secondly, it’s not a novel in the accepted sense. There are two main narratives, a couple of vignettes and a completely bizarre and disconnected short story about a Christian woman suffering for her faith under the Romans. There doesn’t seem to be any attempt to link these disparate elements, unless the leitmotif of The Emperor Waltz is the connecting link – which seems rather banal and unconvincing. Fortunately the two main narratives are compelling enough to have kept me interested, but I do get annoyed at this sort of approach to a really very sensible tradition of having a novel simply be a novel.
However, as I said, I did enjoy the book. The main focus is on 2 characters, Duncan, who opens London’s first gay bookshop, and Christian, a student at the Bauhaus in 1930s Weimar. There’s some compelling characterisation and some clever, if sometimes stereotyped, dialogue. I enjoyed the introduction of the real life characters, and felt I learnt a lot about the Bauhaus. But does it all amount to very much in the end? Possibly not, but if a book offers me a good time then I’m willing to overlook some of its faults. A cautious recommendation.

[Rohase Piercy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well, this was interesting! Set in multiple timelines (but mostly inter-war Germany and 1970s-90s London) it follows the stories of various seemingly unconnected characters who nevertheless do connect in unexpected ways.
In 1920s Weimar, Christian Volgt is trying to establish himself as an artist, studying at the riskily avant-garde Bauhaus. In 1970s London, Duncan Flannery uses an inheritance from his hated father to establish the capital's first gay bookshop.
I know relatively little about the Bauhaus (a little more about developments in inter-war Germany, but these are cleverly kept brooding in the background) - but I do know about 1970s/80s gay London, as I also went to CHE meetings, protested against the confiscation of gay literature by HM Customs & Excise, and experienced the increasingly wary relations between gay men and lesbians as the gay rights movement gathered momentum. Having primed myself to get used to switching between two narratives, I was then rather thrown to find myself at a teenage party apparently taking place 'next year', at the author's hospital bedside whilst he recovers from an infected toe and plots his promotion to a bed by the window, and most bizarrely, back in 3rd century Carthage during the reign of Emperor Septimus Severus, watching the events leading up to something familiar from my Catholic days - the Martyrdom of SS Perpetua and Felicity. (I was rather annoyed, I must say, to find that Felicity, whom I always dubbed 'the Patron Saint of Single Mothers' is neither pregnant nor a mother in Hensher's version, but there we are).
What is the connection between all these stories? Well the Emperor Waltz certainly does feature, sometimes just as a throwaway mention, in all of them except 3rd century Carthage (although come to think of it there is, of course, an Emperor ...) - but otherwise, it's just the clever little details that Hensher is so good at hiding, like Easter Eggs, within the narrative - Perpetua's (apparently historical) gesture of smoothing her hair down in the Arena, echoed by the Bauhaus student as the Nazis finally break down the door; the greasy streak on two hall walls where two unconnected characters habitually rest their head while taking off shoes; Christian Volgt's brother's London encounter with a little boy who reappears in Duncan's bookshop during the 1980s; and there is a common theme of 'us vs them' and the hopeful vision of a new and better world.
It's not only the little details, but also the disappointments and disillusionments, almost invisible to the observer but keenly felt by the subject, that Hensher is so brilliant at depicting - the scene where Duncan finds out what the owner of the sandwich shop opposite, whose friendship he's been trying so hard to cultivate, does to his sandwich before serving it, is heart breaking.
But I'm still confused by the title (not the first of Hensher's titles that's confused me, I must admit). If it were my book, I'd call it 'Intersecting Lines' - referencing the two lines that the Bauhaus students are asked to draw, the second as different from the first as possible, in their first class. But that would probably be much too obvious for an author who's mastery of subtlety is second to none. Five stars from me!

[Ellie Jenkins · Rating 4 out of 5]

A really beautiful book on persecution, resistance and solidarity in several moments in history. Fun, eccentric, hilarious but also extremely sensitive and moving. Loved it.

[Melanie Williams · Rating 3 out of 5]

On the whole this is a well-written novel, though it suffers from having lots of characters, so I found it hard to keep track. I learnt more about the Bauhaus than I knew.

[Liam Ostermann · Rating 3 out of 5]

It took me two goes to finally finish this door stop of a novel which is composed of tales set in a third-century desert settlement on the fringes of the Roman Empire during the Diocletian persecution of Christians; A young artist at the Bauhaus in Weimar in 1922; and finally London in the 1970s and the opening of the UK's first gay bookshop and the notorious campaign to close it down with through legal chicanery (see my footnote *1 below).

Apparently these disparate elements were supposed to delve deep into the human spirit and explore the connections between love, sanctity, commitment and virtue of small groups of men and women trying to change the world through the example of their lives. Or they could just be three novels he never finished and cobbled together.

The writing is compelling but the claims of linkage between the three stories are so opaque as to be non-existent. I don't know if my three stars are insulting or too much. For me this was a classic 'curates egg' of a book, but definitely not a novel.

*1 I have posted this information elsewhere but I don't think it can be posted to many times:

In 1984 the conservative government of Margaret Thatcher attempted to force gays back into the closet by attempting to destroy the 'Gays the Word' bookshop but also to ban a whole swath of gay books imported from abroad. Amazingly this event, important not only for gays but civil liberties in the UK, does not have any kind of Wikipedia entry. Because of this lack I have assembled links to a number of sites which anyone interested in free speech should read. If we don't remember our history we will be condemned to repeat it.

The genesis of the prosecution of 'Gays The Word' was the anger of homophobes to books like 'The Milkman's On His Way' by David Rees which were written for young people and presented being gay as ordinary and nothing to get your-knickers-in-a-twist over. Unfortunately there was no way to ban the offending books because censorship of literature in the UK had been laughed out of court at the 'Lady Chatterley Trial' nearly twenty years earlier. But Customs and Excise did have the ability to seize and forbid the import of 'foreign' books, i.e. those not published in the UK, if they were 'obscene'. As most 'gay' books came from abroad, specifically the USA, this anomaly was the basis for the raid on Gays The Word and the seizure of large amounts of stock. The intention was that the legal costs, plus the disruption to the business, would sink this small independent bookshop long before it came to trial. That it didn't is testimony to the resilience of Gay's The Word, the gay community and all those who supported them.

The best, not perfect, but only, guide to the event is at:

https://www.gayinthe80s.com/2012/10/1...

There follows a series of links to the event connected with an exhibition at the University of London:

The background:

https://www.london.ac.uk/news-events/...

The 142 books seized:

https://exhibitions.london.ac.uk/s/se...

The history of the prosecution:

https://www.london.ac.uk/news-events/...

The fight to clarify the law after the prosecution was dropped:

https://www.london.ac.uk/news-events/...

[Chloë Fowler · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'll say this for Philip Hensher...his books are certainly value for money. I'm a quick reader and his latest book kept me going for nearly a week...on holiday!

I definitely preferred this to Badgers and I put it down feeling satisfied. I found the central waltz/object/person conceit a little obvious at times and there were some characters I didn't 'get' or cared less about, BUT, I do like a Brit gay novel and he's still putting out. As he references Hollinghurst throughout, do we assume he might be publishing next?!

I reckon this is a jolly good novel. It won't win prizes but it will be read by the same people who have read all his others.

[Cold War Conversations Podcast · Rating 4 out of 5]

Challenging but worth the stay

Emperor Waltz comprises of 3 different stories in different places and time: Weimar Germany, London in the late 70s and a Roman city in AD 203. Each follows a common theme of a passion or destiny even when it that may be against the grain of the mainstream.

Whilst not a light read the book is challenging intellectually, but must be recognised an amazing piece of writing that does require its 600 pages plus to deliver its full impact.

Whilst some may be put off by the length, Hensher has created some compelling multi-dimensional charismatic characters and a story that flows easily to the reader.

[James Tidd · Rating 4 out of 5]

A superbly written book that drifts through five different narratives through nine books and a small Epilogue. During the two main narratives, the Emperor Waltz by Johann Strauss the younger drifts through.

The first Book covers Christian Vogt, beginning at a college called the Bauhaus in 1920s Weimar. This continues in Book Five where the author takes a look at Vogt's family history. Book Nine takes us to 1927 and the Bauhaus has relocated to Dassau, and Herr Vogt is now a young tutor. This narrative finishes in the Epilogue, in 1933 in Berlin, where the Bauhaus has again relocated, and is under threat from the newly formed NSADP or Nazi Party.

The second book covers Duncan, who has come to visit his dying Father in 1979. Book Four continues in the same year with Duncan opening a new bookshop in a London street. In the narrative we meet a teenage runaway called Arthur, who ends up working at the said bookshop. Book Eight looks at the period 1983-1998 where Duncan has successfully kept the bookshop running alongside Arthur, who was originally known as Wayne, surviving prosecution by the police for selling illicit material. The narrative ends in the Epilogue with Arthur, now known as Philip living in Berlin being visited by Duncan's niece Celia, wanting to know who her father was.

The remaining three narratives are totally separate from the two main narratives. In Book Three titled Next Year, it is set in modern day (2013?) London, where two teenage twins, Nick and Nathan, are left to keep an eye on two youths, Anita and Basil, who is eleven, where they all take what is undoubtedly an illegal substance called Poppers. Book Six goes all the way back to AD 203, where there are Christians being persecuted and executed by the Roman Empire, for not leaving sacrifices to the Emperor. The narrative covers a merchant's daughter and her slave who is a Christian. Book Seven titled Last Month, is set in a London hospital, where the narrator, unknown to the reader, but who could well be the author himself, has been admitted to the hospital because of a poisoned toe, and longs for a river view of the Thames and the Houses of Parliament. Whilst there he deals with two Irish patients, several nurses and a ward sister, who tells the narrator of her Christian faith.

[Martin · Rating 5 out of 5]

This novel is brimming with characters and thankfully, only a few scenarios which is good as you get some fabulously well painted accounts. I love this kind of portmanteau novel, if you like David Mitchell then this one should be no problem for you to get on with. It does require quite a bit of toing and froing as already mentioned, due to the number of characters involved, you'll probably need to reference back and forth a bit just to remind yourself of who's who.

All though the links between the different places and times seem somewhat tenuous, it is really brilliant when you almost happen upon one! The author places them like clues for the reader to locate, a bit like an archaeological dig. There is a section of the novel, near the beginning that is set in Ancient Roman North Africa. This, on the surface, seems to be at odds with the almost entirely 20th century majority of the text. I won't give it away but there is a rather wonderful link
to ancient Perpetua and a more modern artistic heroine towards the end of the story...

The novel is about minorities up against it and the fanaticism of the few who keep the torches burning bright, so to speak. The story dances along in between places and times and characters to a very satisfying end.

[Joseph Winer · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was really drawn to this novel due to the variety of time periods it was covering, with particular interests in the two primary eras: Weimar, Germany and 1980s London. I think, as other readers have commented, the 1980s section is the most enjoyable, with arcs and characters that feel fleshed out and developed, if occasionally bordering on stereotypes, which didn't really bother me.

The section in the current day feels very out of place, and on a first read I didn't see its necessity for the rest of the novel. Moreover, the two key time eras themselves don't really complement each other I don't think. I was hoping for more connection/mirroring between the periods, rather than the very loose link of the music track.

Hensher does a good job at giving the tone and language of each section its own feel, depending on the era, although a part of me feels this is perhaps more distracting in that it heightens the lack of consistency across the sections.

I spent quite a bit of time working through this, and was quite glad for the final epilogue which I think leaves the novel on a nice ending, even if it doesn't quite tie everything together.

[Ian Cann · Rating 4 out of 5]

A rather beautiful poignant and at times laugh out loud funny interconnected pleasure of a novel. The chapters around the gay bookshop are especially funny in places and throughout there is a certain musicality to the prose and perhaps suggested by the title, the waltz providing perhaps the one solid link between the main running stories in the novel, apart from St Perpetua's part which stands neatly on its own.

Running through the tome though are the themes of outsiders, friendship, love and struggles in the face of adversity be that rising anti-Semitism and Nazis or homophobia and AIDS or other persecution.

Not quite at the full Hollinghurst level for me - more could connect the strands together and the short piece about the teenagers and their slang was a bit out of left field, but still more Hensher in my reading future I think.

[Sandra · Rating 3 out of 5]

This massive tome of a book was so-so for me. It had rave reviews and while I did like it, I wasn’t blown away by it. It really should be two separate books. I enjoy both of the main stories and the connections between the Weimar/Bauhaus and the Gay book shop stories but it just felt disjointed for me. It was too long and the tenuous connections weren’t enough in my opinion, to not break this book up into two separate books. Hensher is a great writer - the characters are well written and curious but some of the side stories get in the way and aren’t needed in the book. I love ancient history but the Perpetua AD 203 part could’ve been dropped and made zero difference to the story. Same with the story about the injured toe. No need for them and it was just a lot of extra reading with no point. Anyhow, it’s a good, but far from great book. ⭐️⭐️⭐️ 3/5

[Dan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I like Philip Hensher's writings, and am used to and enjoy the large books with intertwining tales.

In this book, however, I failed to find the resulting yarn which is made up of those smaller threads. The two main threads were interesting and enjoyable, but the others felt like they were pasted in by accident. Certainly the historical perspectives were valuable.

Maybe it is just a set of short stories which run in parallel rather than series, and which have a couple of small points of continuity? The result was that I got to the end of the 600 pages and felt like I had lost something, rather than gained.

[Holly · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a work of art.

This is my first Philip Hensher and I am now going to have to seek out his back catalog as this was truly astounding.

This is essentially a set of 4-5 stories which are only just barely connected by perhaps a character, an object or a location but which are all connected by the themes which run through them.

I'm going to have to stop there because I need a moment to process this book and everything it was saying. I will be noting it all down and creating a YouTube video dedicated to this book because this needs some time to discuss - masterpiece!

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQGf...

[Isaac Paez · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is perhaps one of the longest books I’ve read in a while. Fun fact: I picked up this copy at Gay’s the Word in London when I was visiting on Holiday about 5 years ago. The storytelling was incredible. I was starting to wonder how each book within this novel was tied together but then it became apparent. I’m I credibly sad that I’m done reading this book, but this is one I’ll keep on my bookshelf and will reread one day. Do pick this book up and read it.

[Steve Griffiths · Rating 1 out of 5]

having read other books by this author i aopproached the enormous tome with confidence that it would keep me in a fictional world for some time. it did. for too long. apart from the wish to dislocate the reader by going to seperate groups of poorly drawn characters it was one of hte most boring books i have read ( to be honest only 2 thirds) . perhaps the professorship of creative writing has gone to his pen

[Leila · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a very long and slow read. Between the two main plot lines, I preferred the one with Duncan and the bookshop (Christian was just... No).
I feel like this one would benefit from being a book club pick, discussing the treated themes, characters, etc. There seems to be plenty to talk about.
The lonely stories in the middle-ish part of the book were a great addition and I enjoyed them plenty.

[Phil Butcher · Rating 4 out of 5]

Different stories spanning Roman North Africa in 200's BC , the Bauhaus art school in Weimar Germany in the 1920's, London in the late 70's and early 80's through to today. All well-written insights into different "outsiders" in their respective societies. This is the 3rd novel by this author I have really enjoyed.

[David O'Connell · Rating 3 out of 5]

Tenously interlinked stories and novellas spanning various time periods. Some great passages but too often tedious and self-indulgent. And the inserted biographical segment about Mr. Hencher stuck in hospital with his sore fucking toe revealed a nastiness in its mean-spirited portrayal of his fellow patients that I found unpalatable. First and possibly last encounter with this author.

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

Charming and free-flowing, multiple intersecting tales of people trying to lead meaningful lives and connect with others. I thought the gay bookshop story was the most fully-drawn but each had its own unique attractions.

[Inge · Rating 2 out of 5]

This started out so promising and only got worse in the end.. TOO MUCH, too many different people and stories and things and where are the connections I am getting so dizzy. Nope. Not for me this one.