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The Orton Diaries [Paperback]

Joe Orton (Author), John Lahr (Editor)
4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)

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Product details

  • Paperback: 304 pages
  • Publisher: Methuen Publishing Ltd; New edition edition (10 May 1998)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0413736504
  • ISBN-13: 978-0413736505
  • Product Dimensions: 19.4 x 12.6 x 2.2 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 655,540 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Joe Orton
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Product Description

Synopsis

From December 1966 until his murder in August 1967, Joe Orton kept a series of diaries that prove to be a candid account of that era. They chronicle his literary success - capped with an Evening Standard Award and praise from the Beatles - and his sexual escapades in unusual places.

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Customer Reviews

4.5 out of 5 stars
8 reviews
4.5 out of 5 stars
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Simply brilliant 14 Mar 2006
By S. J. Payne
Format:Paperback
Three things make The Orton Diaries quite simply an outstanding read:

First, it's a superb portrait of a great creative artist: Orton was one of our best modern playwrights who in his all-too-brief life produced some classics. What he might have given the world if he had lived --- today he would be 73 --- is anybody's guess, but the three truly great plays that he left us with are still loved to this day.
Second, it's an equally marvelous sketch of 1960s London at its most swinging --- groovy baby! Orton casually rubs shoulders with The Beatles, Kenneth Williams and countless other famous figures when the Smoke was the international Capital of Cool.
Third, they are uproariously funny. I have (no false modesty here!) a great sense of humour but relatively few things, books included, make me actually laugh out loud. This book does. Better yet, it STILL does so after about fifteen years and so many re-readings I've lost count.
(I thought about adding: Fourthly, he's also a famous son of my home city of Leicester, but thought better of it!).
Orton's diary is a true, proper diary, genuinely written day to day by himself as an exercise in reflection and self-knowledge. I can't recommend this book highly enough. Buy it, read it, re-read it, treasure it. You'll laugh (often, loud and long), think, and in the end be made sad. Sheer brilliance.

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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars A Word Of Advice: Skip The Introduction 29 Sep 2009
By Wakefield, 2011
Format:Hardcover
'Scandalously entertaining' seems to be the standard comment on these diaries, and I certainly wouldn't disagree. Orton is one of a select band of literary diarists whose works will be of enduring interest - that's because he gives us a complete picture of his life as he's living it, the trivia (making pots of tea, refusing derelicts in railway stations) gets equal space with the major events (receiving awards, appearing on television and ever-so-nearly becoming the Beatles' screenwriter). Bubbling along underneath all this is his fractious relationship with Kenneth Halliwell, whose gradual mental disintegration Orton seems aware of, without taking it as seriously as (we know know) he should have done. Taken all in all, this is as full a picture of London in the sixties as we're ever likely to get....and it's hard not to feel nostalgia for a world that has so totally vanished (Lyons Corner Houses, Late Night Line-Up, Olivier's National Theatre), even - or especially - if you're too young to remember that world at first hand.

Sadly, though, Orton's name once again has to be linked wtih that of his 'official biographer', that clueless fryer of cheeseburgers, John Lahr. If you've read Lahr's biography of Orton, you'll not need to trouble yourself with the thirty or so pages of hokum that precede the main meal here. You'd also do well to ignore Lahr's sappy footnotes, which will helpfully tell you who people like Samuel Johnson and Paul McCartney were/are.

This apart, this is essential reading for anyone interested in theatre in the sixties, the arts in the sixties, or life in the sixties, generally.
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6 of 7 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating and Repelling At The Same Time.... 28 Oct 2006
By Miss Samantha Mitschke
Format:Hardcover
I first encountered Joe Orton in the pages of Kenneth Williams' autobiography, "Just Williams". It was while rummaging around the shelves of a second-hand bookshop recently that I discovered "The Orton Diaries", and, my curiosity about the man rising, I bought it.

I sat and read it from cover to cover in 2 or 3 sittings (university reading, alas, having to take precedence!). Although I knew (courtesy of K.W.) that Orton had written a frank and open diary, I hadn't realised just how frank it would be. His accounts of somewhat sordid searches for sex, coupled with his description of lovers and sexual acts, left me open-mouthed and somewhat repulsed - an effect that I'm sure has Joe grinning, wherever he is today. His views on life and those around him show a wry humour, and also reveal an undercurrent of bitter rage at the world.

The diary is written from after Joe's career as a playwright hit success; it would be interesting to read about life was like for Joe and his lover, Kenneth Halliwell, before Joe hit the big time.

From the diary, it's very easy to see why Halliwell became so angry with Joe and how frustrating life with him must have been. Orton frequently comes across as selfish, arrogant, egotistical and opinionated, and his accounts of his sexual conquests (which, by all accounts, Halliwell was actually able to read, due to Joe's leaving the diary where he could find it) must have saddened and infuriated Halliwell in equal measure. The calm way in which Joe's murder and Halliwell's suicide is recounted at the end really makes you stop and think.

After the tragedy of the ending, there is the brilliant addition of the Edna Welthorpe correspondence - letters that Joe wrote to various people under the guise of various assumed names. They really are brilliantly funny and show the lighter, quirkier side of Joe's character.

All in all, this is a vibrant book, filled with quirks and tragedy throughout, and I thoroughly recommend it to anybody with an interest in people, the world of theatre and playwriting.
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