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The Lamberts: George, Constant and Kit
'Families are societies in miniature.'
The Lamberts: George, Constant and Kit won a Somerset Maugham Award in 1987. A lesson in the fragility of fame, it tells the tragic story of three generations: George, one of Australia's leading painters; his talented composer-conductor son Constant; and grandson Kit, who managed the pop group The Who.
'Motion's project is not just to tell the story of passing generations, which he does very readably and well, but necessarily also to describe and evaluate aspects of English culture - revivalist painting, classical music in the Twenties and Thirties, the foundation of a native ballet, pop music in the Sixties - which he does with considerable confidence and resource.' London Review of Books
'The story of the three Lamberts is as cruel and horrifying as any Greek tragedy... Its portrayal of the way in which the Lamberts instinctively yet unintentionally assisted in the destruction of their own offspring makes for truly compulsive reading.' Harpers and Queen
'An exemplary piece of research' (Sunday Times).
'A biographical triumph.' Observer
The Lamberts: George, Constant and Kit won a Somerset Maugham Award in 1987. A lesson in the fragility of fame, it tells the tragic story of three generations: George, one of Australia's leading painters; his talented composer-conductor son Constant; and grandson Kit, who managed the pop group The Who.
'Motion's project is not just to tell the story of passing generations, which he does very readably and well, but necessarily also to describe and evaluate aspects of English culture - revivalist painting, classical music in the Twenties and Thirties, the foundation of a native ballet, pop music in the Sixties - which he does with considerable confidence and resource.' London Review of Books
'The story of the three Lamberts is as cruel and horrifying as any Greek tragedy... Its portrayal of the way in which the Lamberts instinctively yet unintentionally assisted in the destruction of their own offspring makes for truly compulsive reading.' Harpers and Queen
'An exemplary piece of research' (Sunday Times).
'A biographical triumph.' Observer
- GenresBiography
416 pages, Paperback
First published April 28, 1986
28 people want to read
About the author
Andrew Motion
111 books63 followersSir Andrew Motion, FRSL is an English poet, novelist and biographer, who presided as Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom from 1999 to 2009.
Motion was appointed Poet Laureate on 1 May 1999, following the death of Ted Hughes, the previous incumbent. The Nobel Prize-winning Northern Irish poet and translator Seamus Heaney had ruled himself out for the post. Breaking with the tradition of the laureate retaining the post for life, Motion stipulated that he would stay for only ten years. The yearly stipend of £200 was increased to £5,000 and he received the customary butt of sack.
He wanted to write "poems about things in the news, and commissions from people or organisations involved with ordinary life," rather than be seen a 'courtier'. So, he wrote "for the TUC about liberty, about homelessness for the Salvation Army, about bullying for ChildLine, about the foot and mouth outbreak for the Today programme, about the Paddington rail disaster, the 11 September attacks and Harry Patch for the BBC, and more recently about shell shock for the charity Combat Stress, and climate change for the song cycle I've finished for Cambridge University with Peter Maxwell Davies." In 2003, Motion wrote Regime change, a poem in protest at Invasion of Iraq from the point of view of Death walking the streets during the conflict, and in 2005, Spring Wedding in honour of the wedding of the Prince of Wales to Camilla Parker Bowles. Commissioned to write in the honour of 109 year old Harry Patch, the last surviving 'Tommy' to have fought in World War I, Motion composed a five part poem, read and received by Patch at the Bishop's Palace in Wells in 2008. As laureate, he also founded the Poetry Archive an on-line library of historic and contemporary recordings of poets reciting their own work.
Motion remarked that he found some of the duties attendant to the post of poet laureate difficult and onerous and that the appointment had been "very, very damaging to [his] work". The appointment of Motion met with criticism from some quarters. As he prepared to stand down from the job, Motion published an article in The Guardian which concluded, "To have had 10 years working as laureate has been remarkable. Sometimes it's been remarkably difficult, the laureate has to take a lot of flak, one way or another. More often it has been remarkably fulfilling. I'm glad I did it, and I'm glad I'm giving it up – especially since I mean to continue working for poetry." Motion spent his last day as Poet Laureate holding a creative writing class at his alma mater, Radley College, before giving a poetry reading and thanking Peter Way, the man who taught him English at Radley, for making him who he was. Carol Ann Duffy succeeded him as Poet Laureate on 1 May 2009.
Andrew Motion nació en 1952. Estudió en el University College de Oxford y empezó su carrera enseñando inglés en la Universidad de Hull. También ha sido director de Poetry Review, director editorial de Chatto & Windus, y Poeta Laureado; asimismo, fue cofundador del Poetry Archive, y en 2009 se le concedió el título de Sir por su obra literaria. En la actualidad es profesor de escritura creativa en el Royal Holloway, de la Universidad de Londres. Es miembro de la Royal Society of Literature y vive en Londres. Con un elenco de nobles marineros y crueles piratas, y llena de historias de amor y de valentía, Regreso a la isla del tesoro es una trepidante continuación de La isla del tesoro, escrita con extraordinaria autenticidad y fuerza imaginativa por uno de los grandes escritores ingleses actuales.
Motion was appointed Poet Laureate on 1 May 1999, following the death of Ted Hughes, the previous incumbent. The Nobel Prize-winning Northern Irish poet and translator Seamus Heaney had ruled himself out for the post. Breaking with the tradition of the laureate retaining the post for life, Motion stipulated that he would stay for only ten years. The yearly stipend of £200 was increased to £5,000 and he received the customary butt of sack.
He wanted to write "poems about things in the news, and commissions from people or organisations involved with ordinary life," rather than be seen a 'courtier'. So, he wrote "for the TUC about liberty, about homelessness for the Salvation Army, about bullying for ChildLine, about the foot and mouth outbreak for the Today programme, about the Paddington rail disaster, the 11 September attacks and Harry Patch for the BBC, and more recently about shell shock for the charity Combat Stress, and climate change for the song cycle I've finished for Cambridge University with Peter Maxwell Davies." In 2003, Motion wrote Regime change, a poem in protest at Invasion of Iraq from the point of view of Death walking the streets during the conflict, and in 2005, Spring Wedding in honour of the wedding of the Prince of Wales to Camilla Parker Bowles. Commissioned to write in the honour of 109 year old Harry Patch, the last surviving 'Tommy' to have fought in World War I, Motion composed a five part poem, read and received by Patch at the Bishop's Palace in Wells in 2008. As laureate, he also founded the Poetry Archive an on-line library of historic and contemporary recordings of poets reciting their own work.
Motion remarked that he found some of the duties attendant to the post of poet laureate difficult and onerous and that the appointment had been "very, very damaging to [his] work". The appointment of Motion met with criticism from some quarters. As he prepared to stand down from the job, Motion published an article in The Guardian which concluded, "To have had 10 years working as laureate has been remarkable. Sometimes it's been remarkably difficult, the laureate has to take a lot of flak, one way or another. More often it has been remarkably fulfilling. I'm glad I did it, and I'm glad I'm giving it up – especially since I mean to continue working for poetry." Motion spent his last day as Poet Laureate holding a creative writing class at his alma mater, Radley College, before giving a poetry reading and thanking Peter Way, the man who taught him English at Radley, for making him who he was. Carol Ann Duffy succeeded him as Poet Laureate on 1 May 2009.
Andrew Motion nació en 1952. Estudió en el University College de Oxford y empezó su carrera enseñando inglés en la Universidad de Hull. También ha sido director de Poetry Review, director editorial de Chatto & Windus, y Poeta Laureado; asimismo, fue cofundador del Poetry Archive, y en 2009 se le concedió el título de Sir por su obra literaria. En la actualidad es profesor de escritura creativa en el Royal Holloway, de la Universidad de Londres. Es miembro de la Royal Society of Literature y vive en Londres. Con un elenco de nobles marineros y crueles piratas, y llena de historias de amor y de valentía, Regreso a la isla del tesoro es una trepidante continuación de La isla del tesoro, escrita con extraordinaria autenticidad y fuerza imaginativa por uno de los grandes escritores ingleses actuales.
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
November 24, 2007
The great Lamberts: sort of fucked up and beautiful. The grandfather was a portrait painter, his son was a well-known composer, and the grandson... was the manager of the Who!
My main interest in this book is the Who's manager Kit Lambert - he also produced the classic Who records up to 'Tommy.' In fact he told Pete Townsend to write something much longer like .... an opera.
Drug addict, champagne drinker, gay and an elegant waste, Kit was a remarkable character in British rock n' roll. Not always rich, but always looked wealthy. Also worked with his (non-sexual) partner in crime Chris Stamp, the brother of the great Terence....
My main interest in this book is the Who's manager Kit Lambert - he also produced the classic Who records up to 'Tommy.' In fact he told Pete Townsend to write something much longer like .... an opera.
Drug addict, champagne drinker, gay and an elegant waste, Kit was a remarkable character in British rock n' roll. Not always rich, but always looked wealthy. Also worked with his (non-sexual) partner in crime Chris Stamp, the brother of the great Terence....
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April 29, 2023A very good book, despite factual inaccuracies. Keith Richards being referred to as 'Keith Richard' isn't entirely wrong given he was sometimes known as such in the 1960s and 1970s, but still rings false to the ear without the disclaimer. The idea that punk was born in 1979 (not 1975/66 or earlier) is palpably wrong (p. 364). I cannot speak to belle epoque portraiture or modernist music, which Motion's writing suggests may be more his ballpark.
What does work very well here, undeniably, is his weaving of three male bloodlines that repeat the sins of the fathers (or at least, the sinned sons). This is tragedy as Everyman's inheritance, beautifully if sometimes journalistically put, with an eye for an arresting end of chapter. I have no problem with this.
Motion is best known for his poetry, but this demonstrates Maugham Prize-winning precocity that makes me fully appreciate the perpetual inequality of our educational system. One day we may have a schooling system that makes such eloquence realisable for all, when the rest of us may know more than the pop hits.
What does work very well here, undeniably, is his weaving of three male bloodlines that repeat the sins of the fathers (or at least, the sinned sons). This is tragedy as Everyman's inheritance, beautifully if sometimes journalistically put, with an eye for an arresting end of chapter. I have no problem with this.
Motion is best known for his poetry, but this demonstrates Maugham Prize-winning precocity that makes me fully appreciate the perpetual inequality of our educational system. One day we may have a schooling system that makes such eloquence realisable for all, when the rest of us may know more than the pop hits.
March 5, 2023
Read this book for my PhD research as Constant Lambert was a very close friend of Anthony Powell (whose novels are the subject of my thesis). The book gave a very good insight into the Lambert family and, for reasons stated above, I was most interested in its descriptions of Constant's bohemian lifestyle (with many quotations by Powell which were an extra delight for me).
May 16, 2017
Incredibly entertaining book!
Family history of Lambert addictive and tragic. The most interesting character for me was the son of Constant's Kit (1935-1981). I did not know before that he was gay (as we know, his father was very fond of women). Unfortunately, their life was short...
Family history of Lambert addictive and tragic. The most interesting character for me was the son of Constant's Kit (1935-1981). I did not know before that he was gay (as we know, his father was very fond of women). Unfortunately, their life was short...
November 17, 2024
A harrowing tale of intergenerational trauma. I gave an ohhhh of recognition more than once.
May 11, 2024
Een merkwaardige dynastie kunstenaars was de familie Lambert: George, Constant en Christopher, vereeuwigd in de drievoudige biografie The Lamberts (2018) van Andrew Motion (1952). George was een populaire schilder aan het begin van de vorige eeuw die inmiddels totaal in de vergetelheid is geraakt. Dat geldt ook voor zijn zoon Constant, musicus en componist, die het bekende balletgezelschap Sadler’s Wells oprichtte, maar wiens muziek nauwelijks nog wordt gespeeld. Diens zoon Christopher (‘Kit’) is bekend als invloedrijke manager van rockgroep The Who. Alle drie stierven jong, al dan niet geholpen door drank en drugs. Constant leeft voort als het karakter Hugh Moreland in de twaalfdelige romancyclus A Dance to the Music of Time (1951-1975) van Anthony Powell. Het wonder van dit boek is de manier waarop Motion met overtuigende autoriteit schrijft over beeldende kunst, klassieke muziek én de rockscene. De zelfdestructieve neigingen van Constant en Kit - vooral hij - staan garant voor een naargeestige leeservaring, door Motion buitengewoon goed weergegeven.
July 15, 2014
Interesting but amazingly depressing as all three men ended their lives in alchoholic or drug-fueled hazes. I enjoyed learning more about George and Constant - especially Constant's involvement in British ballet in the 1940s.
December 23, 2022
Too boring. Read read read, I'm still in the first Lambert. DNF page 62
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews