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Old Filth [Paperback]

Jane Gardam (Author)
4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (56 customer reviews)
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Book Description

Publication Date: 27 Oct 2005

FILTH, in his heyday, was an international lawyer with a practice in the Far East. Now, only the oldest QCs and Silks can remember that his nickname stood for Failed In London Try Hong Kong.

Long ago, Old Filth was a Raj orphan - one of the many young children sent 'Home' from the East to be fostered and educated in England. Jane Gardam's new novel tells his story, from his birth in what was then Malaya to the extremities of his old age.

Brilliantly constructed - going backwards and forwards in time, yet constantly working towards the secret at its core - OLD FILTH is funny and heart-breaking, witty and peopled with characters who astonish, dismay and delight the reader. Jane Gardam is as sensitive to the 'jungle' within children as she is to the eccentricities of the old.

A touch of magic combines with compassion, humour and delicacy to make OLD FILTH a genuine masterpiece.

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Product details

  • Paperback: 272 pages
  • Publisher: Abacus; New Ed edition (27 Oct 2005)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 034911840X
  • ISBN-13: 978-0349118406
  • Product Dimensions: 12.6 x 19.7 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (56 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 7,002 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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More About the Author

› Visit Amazon's Jane Gardam Page
Jane Gardam
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Product Description

Review

A well-executed plot, fascinating characters, humorous moments, varied settings, a study of the ageing process; this book is a thoroughly enjoyable read and offers plenty for discussion. (NEW BOOKS MAGAZINE)

A novel of great perception and quietly killing prose. (INDEPENDENT)

Gardam invents an apparently composed character, and then disassembles him into pieces which- on closer inspection-look jagged and in poor repair: unhappy memories, cooled emotions, a broken heart. (INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY)

Gardam, the supreme novelist of young girls, also does old age brilliantly and proves that she can penetrate the male psyche too. (GUARDIAN WEEKLY)

Book Description

A genuine masterpiece - funny, brilliant, wise: - 'runner-up' (the GUARDIAN) for the Orange Prize.
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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews
62 of 64 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Clever, subtle and very funny 30 Oct 2006
By bookpike
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
A gentle yet gripping story (I won't indulge in spoilers see reviewer below if you want your pleasure ruined) that describes the life of a distinguished judge taking the unpleasant consequences of his childhood and carefully unwrapping them to show how they have echoed and shaped his adult life. The book is at different times very funny but also very poignant and tragic. I think the great strength of Gardam's writing lies in her effortless understatement. Too many writers now either have nothing to say or else tell their stories with great big hairy signposts you can't fail to miss.

Engaging and intelligent without being obscure and all done in less than 250 pages - amazing!
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44 of 47 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars A real treat 19 Mar 2006
By Ralph Blumenau TOP 500 REVIEWER
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
Don’t be put off by the horrid title or by the fact that the main character, whose real name is Sir Edward Feathers, is frequently referred to as Filth, even by his loving wife: the nickname of this distinguished lawyer who had made his career in the Far East, stood for Failed In London Try Hong Kong. Otherwise no name could be less appropriate for this old man who is described as “spectacularly clean” and whose kaleidoscopic life story, in England and the Far East, this is. It would be a spoiler if I described it or the gaps in the story which the author leaves to our imagination to fill in.

The book and the characters in it are quirky, funny, sad, and touching; the touches of period flavour (ca. 1923 to 2002 - though there seems to be an error on the very last page) are spot-on; and Jane Gardam’ style is idiosyncratic, often staccato, but a pleasure to read. Her similes or descriptions are never hackneyed, never forced, but always fresh and arresting. I found the novel a real treat.

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17 of 18 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Funny and moving 18 Sep 2005
By A Customer
Format:Hardcover
What marvelous characters! This book opens a whole world--the world of the Raj Orphans, those sent back to Britain from the farflung Empire between the two wars--and makes it come alive through the complex character of Edward Feathers, Old Filth. As he moves in and out of time, his experiences bring to the reader not only magically historical moments but characters so beautifully drawn their equals are rarely seen in modern fiction. From his best friend at school to the "Chinese dwarf" with whom he sails back East as a teenager to his mad cousin Babs, the cast of Old Filth's life turns out to be rich and quirky and not at all what many of his admirers might have guessed as they describe him as someone to whom "nothing happened."
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15 of 17 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars the best novel I've read this year 7 Aug 2005
By A Customer HALL OF FAME TOP 1000 REVIEWER
Format:Hardcover
Although I have no great hopes of Old Filth making even the Booker long-list, it is by far the best work of fiction I've read this year - and I've read the McEwen, the Barnes, the Ishiguro, the Mantel etc. etc that keep getting hyped. They all have their merits, but this is the only one that is a work of art. It is about a generation that rarely gets noticed in fiction, the ones who grew up when Britian still had an Empire, then lost it. Emotionally crippled, brave, uncomplaining and ofdten as successful professionally as they were a mess emotionally, Old Filth is their emblem.
Born in Malaya, he gets handed over to a native wet-nurse, and has five years of happiness before being exiled to a monstrous home in Britain. Gardam quotes the inscription on the wall of the Inner Temple "Lawyers, I suppose, were children once", as with exquisite compassion and irony she shows how Eddie Fevvers had his ripped away from him, and how, like the boy in Kipling's story Baa Baa Black Sheep, tried to defend himself and others against violence and cruelty.
He is healed, somewhat, by a sympathetic best friend who gets killed, and by a teacher who recognises his brilliance and helps him get into Cambridge. A picaresque journey out to the supposed safety of the Far East eventually lead to a distinguished career in Hong Kong, where his wife is unfaithful with his great rival (now neighbour). Yet what is remarkable about the novel isn't the linear progression of a man's life over 90 years, it's the way it shows time in free-fall after bereavement and before death. There is a caustic, comic quality very like Beckett's End Game in its portrayal of the very old. Despite all the tragedies of Filth's life, it manages to keep a kind of buoyancy to it that make is life-affirming as well as very moving.... Read more ›
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21 of 24 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars A Rembrandt portrait of a man - funny, tragic, compelling 19 Jan 2005
By A. Craig HALL OF FAME TOP 1000 REVIEWER
Format:Hardcover
Although I haven't quite finished it yet, I already know this is the novel I'll be urging readers to buy this year. It's so good I'm savouring it every night...like Shirley Hazzard's The Great Fire, it has the absolute mastery of tone which perhaps can only come at the peak of a novelist's career.
Old Filth (Failed In London Try Hong Kong)is a retired octogenarian barrister whose formidable wife Betty has just died. Unable to feel her loss consciously, he drives across England to visit the other two "Raj orphans" of his boyhood, both women, having an "internal telephone conversation" with his dead wife while pretending things are normal. Interwoven with this is the story of Edward Fevvers, whose mother died in childbirth and who was exiled from the paradise in Malasia where his malarial father lived. His betrayals and reversals make up an agonising portrait of mental suffering which is never fully confronted, but which is also mediated by a gift for irony. Gardam is one of our finest writers, and her perennial theme is how the human spirit survives despite great loneliness and against seemingly insurmountable odds. Her other great novels are Crusoe's Daughter, God on the Rocks and Queen of the Tambourine. If she doesn't at least get short-listed for the Booker with this it will be a crying shame.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars wonderful
A classic. My old copy went missing in a house move, so I bought another, re-read it after some years and found it even better than the first time round.
Published 4 days ago by L I Fix
5.0 out of 5 stars Great writing
The title attracted me, The writing is superb, an example to anyone trying to write a book. I loved the story. A real page turner.
Published 27 days ago by S. M. Pettit
5.0 out of 5 stars Interesting read.
Excellent. Bought the book after reading a short story about Old Filth. Very good, will read more if its possible.
Published 1 month ago by SueL
5.0 out of 5 stars Unexpected little twists
I really enjoyed this book. I didn't really know what to expect but it does give you an insight into the Raj children. Read more
Published 1 month ago by sara
4.0 out of 5 stars a good read
I bought this book because I had previously read for my book club, 'the man in the wooden hat' - the complement to this one. I had enjoyed the story and the very good writing. Read more
Published 1 month ago by sally rose
5.0 out of 5 stars Fabulous!
HOW I enjoyed this book. Having, to my shame, never heard of Jane Gardam, I read a review of her latest book in the New York Times and decided to download the whole Old Filth... Read more
Published 2 months ago by jackrock
3.0 out of 5 stars Old filth
Not what I expected or I was hoping for. Difficult at times when the author takes us from present to past times. Read more
Published 2 months ago by Angela Thomson
5.0 out of 5 stars A great recommendation
It is rare that I finish a book and want to read it again, immediately. Slightly puzzling at first but then the novel rolled along, capturing my heart!
Published 2 months ago by G. Cremin
5.0 out of 5 stars Jane Gardam is always good
Well written, finely crafted, great depth; evocative descriptions of places; the story and the characters stay with you. Excellent as usual
Published 2 months ago by Sarah Simeon
3.0 out of 5 stars Bizarre and faintly unsavoury
Gardam is an accomplished writer who excels at portraying believable and sympathetic characters. "Old filth" is generally acknowledged as her "magnum opus" and many Amazon reviews... Read more
Published 3 months ago by Daniel Park
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