Juneteenth Roundup

–This week’s Sunday Telegraph has an article entitled “The books that every 16-year-old boy should be reading.” This included short selections by several writers, including Simon Heffer who recommends Waugh’s Decline and Fall:

When I was 16 and thinking of trying to get into Cambridge to read English, my marvellous English master gave me a pile of novels, plays and poetry to consume, reaching far outside the English A-level course. Hidden away among the heavy novels was a slim volume called Decline and Fall, by Evelyn Waugh. I had never read anything like it; jokes on every page, many of them quite offensive, ridicule of the aristocracy, the Church, the penal system and, above all, schools, and all told in a relentless drive that caused me to finish the book in two or three hours. I had within weeks read everything else Waugh wrote, and I doubt I was the only youth on whom he had that effect. His style is magnificent and his appeal irrestible.

Heffer doesn’t tell us the year in which his binge-reading took place. His online biography says he was born in 1960, so he would have been 16 in 1976.  At that age he would have been able to read all of Waugh’s writings published in his lifetime, as well as the diaries which were published that same year.

–An article entitled “Let slip the dogs of Waugh” was recently mentioned as appearing in the Baltimore Sun. This was written in 2018 by the Sun’s then long-time literary editor John McIntyre. The article opens with this: “Even that prickly person Evelyn Waugh, never shy about parading his opinions, was quite aware that the things people complain about in language and usage are generally idiosyncratic preferences.” It seems to have been published in the edition of 12 June 2018 but a search of the paper for that date on both my library subscriptions failed to turn anything up.  It may have been reprinted on 17 June 2025, in which it seems to have been mentioned, but a subscription search of that edition was equally unsuccessful. What little can be read of the article on the search page sounds promising so perhaps one of our readers might be able to access it and report on the contents in a comment as provided below.

–A reviewer identifying as “Jim” has written and posted a review of Waugh’s Robbery Under Law on the website goodreads.com. Here is a copy:

Just because a writer is an exceptional novelist, it does not follow that he or she is also an astute economist or politician. Evelyn Waugh’s Robbery under law: The Mexican object-lesson” is a rather objectionable hatchet job. In his book, Waugh is so outraged by Lazaro Cardenas’s nationalization of the Anglo-American oil industry in Mexico that I cannot help but think he was an investor who lost money.

I read a little more than half the book before I decided I had better things to do than finish the book, including clipping my toenails. Poor Mexico has been hauled over the coals by too many foreigners who have never bothered to acquaint themselves with the country or its people.

Consequently, I will continue to love Waugh’s fiction, but I will have my head examined before reading any polemics written by him.

If the reader had possessed a bit more background, he might have usefully continued his reading. He seems to have been unaware that Waugh wrote the book under a contract to a disappointed British investor who was looking for just such a hatchet-job. Waugh was not proud of the book and never authorized its republication during his lifetime. The second half of the book is a more thoughtfully written description of the history and position of the Roman Catholic Church in Mexico which, in the 20th century, was perhaps comparable to that of private investors in the Mexican petroleum industry.

–The Mitford family is enjoying a good deal of press and broadcast coverage in anticipation of the debut this week of a new TV series about them entitled Outrageous. One of the more interesting articles appeared in Women’s Wear Daily which put together a survey of its previous articles relating to the family, several of which also involved Evelyn Waugh and his family:

…Hatty Waugh, the daughter of novelist and social satirist Evelyn Waugh, was the subject of a 1978 profile in WWD’s Arts & People column. At the time, Waugh refused to pay $1.50 to purchase a magazine that had published a favorable review of her second novel “Mother’s Footsteps.” Her debut novel, “Mirror, Mirror,” was panned when it was released in the U.S. “Critics said that I was a pathetic writer just cashing in on Daddy’s name,” Waugh told reporter Valerie Wade. “Somebody even bought it because it got the worst review he’d ever seen. Actually, I thought the book was a laugh a line.”

In 1985, WWD writer Christopher Petkanas profiled controversial Mitford sister Diana Mosley, nee Guinness, on the publication of her book “Loved Ones,” which included portraits of her social circle including Evelyn Waugh and Mosley’s husband, and British fascist leader, Sir Oswald Mosley. Asked about the popular interest in her family, Mosley — who was imprisoned during WWII for her close ties to the Nazi regime — said, “The press decides on certain families and writers about them without much reason, really. They force one to the front of the stage, then say, ‘How boring.’ So, you see, they have it both ways. What Shakespeare said is so true, really: The appetite grows with what it feeds on.”

The following year, Marybeth Kerrigan reported on the filming of Evelyn Waugh’s comic novel “Scoop” in London, based on her experience as a war correspondent in the 1930s. “We’re hooked on nostalgia in this country — we’re addicted to it,” said film star Nicola Pagett. “We will not let go of the great days gone by. Of course, we do it well — our energies and emotions are there.”

In 2004, Stephen Fry discussed “Bright Young Things,” his screen adaptation of Waugh’s novel “Vile Bodies,” which he first read as a teenager. Fry directed the film, which starred Emily Mortimer and Stephen Campbell Moore. Fry mulled the modern day version — or lack thereof — of “bright young things,” and how the golden age of parties was long past. “They’re all vulgar commercials funded by the studios or sponsored by Grey Goose and Tattinger Champagne. I never, ever accept an invitation to something that has the name of a luxury goods company on it,” Fry told WWD writer Marshall Heyman. “You can’t ever be a Bright Young Thing,” he added. “You can be a youth with a zest for life and a love of language and nothing that is part of a commercial. You musn’t be selfish. You musn’t be thinking, ‘Look at me.’ If you find yourself following, just go ‘Baaa.’”…

–Finally, an ambitious website contributor has posted all pages of the so-called “Victorian Blood Book” in Waugh’s book collection at the University of Texas. This is on the website flashbak.com. Here’s a description:

The book’s decoupage (paper and card stuck on the page) was created from hundreds of engravings, many from collections of etchings by the writer William Blake (28 November 1757 – 12 August 1827) and other early nineteenth-century books. There are images from nature (flowers, insects, animals and the same image of a bird on every page – a large drop of blood-red India ink dripping from each of its wings) and Christian identity (the crucifixion and crusaders – all apparently dripping blood). For added depth, the book’s maker has added religious commentary.

The first if the book’s 41 plates (above) contains a short table of contents and the title “Durenstein!” – Dürenstein is the Austrian castle at which England’s King Richard I (8 September 1157 – 6 April 1199), known as Richard the Lionheart, was held captive on his way back from the Crusades.

The title and the theme of many of the plates relate to the spiritual battles encountered by Christians along the path of life and the “blood” of Christian sacrifice.