A Handful of Dust and Decline and Fall

by Evelyn Waugh

Waugh at his devastatingly best in two great novels: "A Handful of Dust" and "Decline and Fall," coupled together in a "Laurel Edition" from Dell Publishing.

Genres: Fiction, Humor, Novels

416 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1959

About the author

Evelyn Waugh's father Arthur was a noted editor and publisher. His only sibling Alec also became a writer of note. In fact, his book “The Loom of Youth” (1917) a novel about his old boarding school Sherborne caused Evelyn to be expelled from there and placed at Lancing College. He said of his time there, “…the whole of English education when I was brought up was to produce prose writers; it was all we were taught, really.” He went on to Hertford College, Oxford, where he read History. When asked if he took up any sports there he quipped, “I drank for Hertford.”

In 1924 Waugh left Oxford without taking his degree. After inglorious stints as a school teacher (he was dismissed for trying to seduce a school matron and/or inebriation), an apprentice cabinet maker and journalist, he wrote and had published his first novel, “Decline and Fall” in 1928.

In 1928 he married Evelyn Gardiner. She proved unfaithful, and the marriage ended in divorce in 1930. Waugh would derive parts of “A Handful of Dust” from this unhappy time. His second marriage to Audrey Herbert lasted the rest of his life and begat seven children. It was during this time that he converted to Catholicism.

During the thirties Waugh produced one gem after another. From this decade come: “Vile Bodies” (1930), “Black Mischief” (1932), the incomparable “A Handful of Dust” (1934) and “Scoop” (1938). After the Second World War he published what is for many his masterpiece, “Brideshead Revisited,” in which his Catholicism took centre stage. “The Loved One” a scathing satire of the American death industry followed in 1947. After publishing his “Sword of Honour Trilogy” about his experiences in World War II - “Men at Arms” (1952), “Officers and Gentlemen” (1955), “Unconditional Surrender" (1961) - his career was seen to be on the wane. In fact, “Basil Seal Rides Again” (1963) - his last published novel - received little critical or commercial attention.

Evelyn Waugh, considered by many to be the greatest satirical novelist of his day, died on 10 April 1966 at the age of 62.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evelyn_W...

Reviews

[Realini Ionescu · Rating 5 out of 5]

A Handful of Dust by Evelyn Waugh is 497th on The Greatest Books of All Time site, and in my Top 200, which you could see on my blog https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/20...

10 out of 10


Evelyn Waugh is one of my favorite writers, even though I have learned that he was not the nicest man to know, snobbish, he appeared to dismiss someone, when he found that she was not an aristocrat – we have only to read Intellectuals https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/20... and see that Leo Tolstoy, Ernest Hemingway, Henrik Ibsen, Jan Jacques Rousseau were not monuments of magnanimity

For all his shortcomings, Anthony Last of Hetton aka Tony is my favorite here, surely in large part because I identify with him, for all the visible differences, and I share a rather unhappy marital state with him, while I see the humor in a figure like Beaver- "What's Beaver?" "It's a young man." "That sounds all right."
It all starts as a mistake, when John Beaver arrives at the estate of Hetton, after sending a telegram, so that the hosts could not prevent his arrival – he was invited – or not, there is a question over that – with the understanding that he will see the real meaning, and now he has to be hosted – ‘Anyway he can go into Sir Galahad. No one who sleeps there ever comes again-the bed's agony I believe." We cannot foresee the future though

Lady Brenda Last is different from her husband, and better able to play the host, while Anthony Last is going about with his habits, attending church service, coming back with button flowers, meanwhile John Beaver is not affected by a cold reception, the oppressive room he had been assigned, he is not popular in society
Ergo, he is used to be snubbed, and besides, he has this outré, perhaps even pathological side, he is so attached to his mother, listening to what she says, like a small child – at one point, she decides to take him to America and he obeys – he is called at the last moment, to take the place of a missing guest as a rule

Nevertheless, Brenda spends time with him, and because of a variety of reasons, mainly she had been bored in this place she does not really like, Hetton – Tony on the other hand is dedicated to the estate, almost all the expense goes into the expensive maintenance, repair of this large mansion, the big number of employees
It will be both amusing and painful to see Mrs. Beaver come to the property and start a project to change one of the rooms, destroying it really, only to make money for herself, with chromium walls and other horrors, because Brenda would be by then infatuated with her son and willing to inflict pain on her husband to be intimate with the lover

In her defense, she had to take the train to London, third class, because they had to spare expenses for the sake of the estate and the large number of servants, gardeners, albeit she does come across as heartless at some points – we understand that Waugh based this on personal experience and a traumatic divorce
Lady Brenda Last has an affair with John Beaver, and she wants to spend most of her time in London, claiming first one interest, then saying she will take lectures in economy, furthermore, despite the fact that their finances are strained, she wants to have this flat, provided and furnished by Mrs. Beaver, who else?

Her husband is baffled and incomprehensive, only such a gentleman – or a Pangloss https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/20... that he accepts the arrangement, and ends up being one of the few left unaware of the affair, which could be misinterpreted somehow
It is said that man or woman had interfered and caused the marriage to end, except that is the symptom, effect, not the cause, when something like Brenda and Beaver happens, it is because it had not been working anyway – a tragedy takes place to change the course of events, in what would be the climax and nadir of the narrative

Before that nevertheless, Brenda and her new friends try to arrange something for Tony to feel better, they bring this bizarre and mirthful character, who claims to be some royalty, because she had married some abusive, Moroccan fellow, and she would be the mistress of the cuckold spouse, at least that is the plan
Alas, there is a denouement – spoiler alert here – Brenda and Tony have a son, John Andrew, who is about nine or so – I could not remember if we know the age, but there it is – and he wants to take part in this large (abominable if you ask me) hunt that takes place on the estate, and around it most likely, organized periodically

The hunters do not find the fox in the time assigned for the child to be with the party, so he has to come back, but a terrible accident takes place, a very agitated horse is scared by the explosion of some gas in a motorcycle, kicks the boy down and kills him instantly, leading to a rather disgusting scene, maybe understandable
When Jock, friend of the family – the spoiler alert is still on, he would marry Brenda later – comes to tell her about the death of her son, she says ‘Thank God!”, because she had been sacred that the heinous news would be about…her lover, to get away from it all, Anthony Last is off on an expedition in the Amazon, which ends up with him saved by this awful individual, Mr. Todd , who has him reading from Dickens https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/20...

Now for my standard closing of the note with a question, and invitation – maybe you have a good idea on how we could make more than a million dollars with this https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/20... – as it is, this is a unique technique, which we could promote, sell, open the Oscars show with or something and then make lots of money together, if you have the how, I have the product, I just do not know how to get the befits from it, other than the exercise per se

There is also the small matter of working for AT&T – this huge company asked me to be its Representative for Romania and Bulgaria, on the Calling Card side, which meant sailing into the Black Sea wo meet the US Navy ships, travelling to Sofia, a lot of activity, using my mother’s two bedrooms flat as office and warehouse, all for the grand total of $250, raised after a lot of persuasion to the staggering $400…with retirement ahead, there are no benefits, nothing…it is a longer story, but if you can help get the mastodont to pay some dues, or have an idea how it can happen, let me know

As for my role in the Revolution that killed Ceausescu, a smaller Mao, there it is http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/03/r...

Some favorite quotes from To The Hermitage and other works

‘Fiction is infinitely preferable to real life...As long as you avoid the books of Kafka or Beckett, the everlasting plot of fiction has fewer futile experiences than the careless plot of reality...Fiction's people are fuller, deeper, cleverer, more moving than those in real life…Its actions are more intricate, illuminating, noble, profound…There are many more dramas, climaxes, romantic fulfillment, twists, turns, gratified resolutions…Unlike reality, all of this you can experience without leaving the house or even getting out of bed…What's more, books are a form of intelligent human greatness, as stories are a higher order of sense…As random life is to destiny, so stories are to great authors, who provided us with some of the highest pleasures and the most wonderful mystifications we can find…Few stories are greater than Anna Karenina, that wise epic by an often foolish author…’

[S Moss · Rating 5 out of 5]

Handful of Dust is his comic masterpiece, whereby a man enamored of Sir Thomas Mallory's world of chivary and romance ends up trapped in a Brazilian jungle reading Dickens' novels about poverty and lower-class suffering until his death. Rating is based only on Handful. Decline and Fall is a more ordinary satire of English university life, not especially relevant to a non-English reader. Decline and Fall is two-three stars.

[Susan Coleman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thoroughly enjoyed these short novels. I hadn't read any Waugh since college when "The Loved One" was on the reading list for an English class. The cleverness of that book stayed with me all these years. I hope to read more by this very talented author.

[Andrea Dowd · Rating 4 out of 5]

I picked up "Handful of Dust" expecting to read a dry, British novel. I was unexpectedly drawn in to the story of John and Brenda Last, a well-to-do couple in the 30s who hit a marital bump in the road when she takes up a lover in the city and experience a family tragedy. In order to escape from an expensive divorce and potential need to sell his family seat, John decides to tag along with an explorer to Brazil's jungles. The novel take a quiet but chilling turn and makes "Handful of Dust" one of the better British novels I've read.

The great particulars of this novel are the simple character details and sometimes, harsh look at the British aristocracy, the painful example of stoicism shown during a child's demise, and the casual turn of story when John becomes trapped outside of his own world. I had read that the American version of Evelyn Waugh's novel was supposed to be much different and happier than what was originally planned. Waugh's novel would not have made The Modern Library's 100 Greatest List if he had made those changes.

Read this book for the juicy Brits in the 30s bits and stay for the creepy/tragic end.

[Kristin · Rating 4 out of 5]

An amusing look into British society during the post-modern period. While the first half of this book drags a bit for my tastes, it picks up in the second half and becomes quite entertaining. While Waugh isn't my favorite post-modern author, Decline and Fall is a quick and easy read for anyone who wants a quick taste of what that literary era was like.

[Anna Kennedy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Decline and Fall is the story of Paul Pennyfeather, a rather unexciting character who manages to drift through fantastic and captivating incidents and situations in 1920s England and Wales surrounded by fascinating personalities and hilarious consequences to his mild actions. A really enjoyable read, loved it.

[Gib · Rating 4 out of 5]

both novels worth reading, biting satire and great humor - imagine having being a prisoner and having to read Dickens to your captor the rest of your life!