Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Worth a look, 29 Jun 2007
Michael Barber took on an impossible job with this biography, because Anthony Powell led a quiet life that does not make for a gripping narrative. I read this book in parallel with Zachary Leader's life of Kingsley Amis, a good friend of Powell's, and was struck by the contrast; the former a compulsive womaniser, boozer and party-thrower, the latter a quiet, famously enigmatic chap who liked "Art", early nights and country walks.
But of course, all this is irrelevant is you know and love Powell's fiction. Better to read the memoirs and journals for the joy of the master's prose, but Barber's book is worth a look for an outsider's take on Powell's life. He must have written this biography because he loved Powell's writing, and so deserves credit for his good taste if nothing else.
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7 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Determined to reach the end..., 20 Feb 2006
Cyril Connolly claims it was that enjoyable he read it twice. I hope he was being ironic. I knew nothing about Powell, save only his existence. I'm half way through and feel nothings changed. The biggest problem, I feel, lies in Barber's style. Or utter lack of it. 'Hardly inspiring' thought Powell. I agree. It sounds like it was written by an A Level literature student, and as an essay which has go on for far too long. A crime rarely committed by A Level students, who often don't have the leisure or inclination. Unfortunately Barber clearly had both. I feel the biggest problem is the irrelevant asides Barber frequently goes into. I was put off at the very beginning with Barber's dilemma over how to correctly address his subject. Powell apparently hated the promiscuity of first name use, and so Anthony was out. Mr Powell simply wouldn't do, whereas merely Powell would assume they were social equals. He decides on Powell nonetheless, and we're asked to forgive him for this insult. There aren't words... And his very frequently habit of breaking up the flow of the narrative to find everyone we encounter a place in Powell's work is also very trying. And these connections are often so very tenuous they hardly warrant a mention. In addition to some frankly embarrasing links it's all just a bit non-directional and fluffy. The actual character of Powell is lost somewhere amongst it all, and that which does show through portrays him as exceedingly dull. But i'm going to battle on. But please, no one follow me.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Dance to no music with two left feet, 30 Jan 2009
Having thoroughly enjoyed both my readings of Powell's Dance to the Music of Time, I looked forward to learning more about the author and his work. Having read this book, I still do. The cover photograph acts as a helpful warning - yes, an arty (or at least black & white) photo of Powell is used, but there is, almost in the middle, a big blurry bit, which if you look closely is a cat. Apparently Powell liked cats, but this does not make the picture any more interesting or appropriate. The preface, with Barber's self abasing o how should I refer to the Great Man I am not worthy paragraph, provides an even stronger warning about the problem of continuing the book...
If Barber cannot bring himself, without ludicrous cringing, to refer to Powell according to biographical convention, how can the reader rely upon him to produce a useful book? The early part of the biography, dealing with Powell's family background (important for someone so interested in genealogy) and education at Eton gives very little impression of Powell himself, who does not really appear in the book until he has finished at Oxford. In the meantime, we are provided with random facts and gossip about people and things at both Eton and Oxford, which mean little to those who were not there. More explanations and concentration on Powell's experiences would help. Surely, at Oxford especially, there could be more about the social conditions there when Powell was up (not just that it wasnt like Brideshead, I think most people have worked that one out)given the interwar years were quite interesting. We could be clearly informed of what he read & perhaps why, and been spared Barber's little joke about it being at Oxford then 'sapiens to be homo', which only adds to the pain. Indeed, we could be spared many little jokes and clever uses of quotes. We are admirers of Powell's writing, not Barber's.
As Powell starts work & engages more with the world, Barber brings him a little more into focus. Sadly, it is hard to see him in the crowds of nearly every single person he ever met being shown to be important to the Dance. And again, we dont necessarily learn who these people are or were, other than that they were part of the correct cliques. Barber repeats gossip without necessarily supporting it (as about Gerald Duckworth's assult of his step sister Virginia Stephens [later Woolf] - possibly true, but included for no real reason other than chat), and without a clear narrative, everything just jumbles together. The Second World War provides at least some direction, and the years following it, as Powell wrote the Dance, are a bit easier to follow, but Barber continues confuse Powell's life and the development of his work. The reader is informed that the Dance was originally intended to be in six parts - Why? When did it change to 12? Why did this happen? The odd friend & reviewer seems to have known this, but not others. What about the non-reviewing readership? And why wouldn't Americans be able to cope with books with a first person narrator, as Barber claims?
Powell's later life, as he finished the Dance, is a little less crowded, and reading about literary fights is always amusing - but why do we need to know that Barber calls Auberon Waugh Bron? - , yet we still learn little about the development of the book over the years. Barber notes that Powell was interviewed regularly, but provides little information as to what he said in the interviews. The accounts of Barber's own interview and lunch with Powell are provided, and one cannot but help agree with Powell's assesment. The reader is regularly informed of Powell's snobbery, which is an widely-agreed upon component of his work and life, but again Barber makes little effort to demonstrate the role it played. Perhaps it is Barber's lack of access to Powell's personal papers, and Powell did keep his personal life out of the public eye, but the near absolute lack of reference to his family is troublesome. The absence of Powell's parents from the time they send him to Eton until they die (with only the noting in passing of his father's refusal to buy in to Duckworths to help Powell's career) is odd, especially given Barber's view that everyone Powell met influenced the Dance - surely his parents would have some influence beyond what we see of Jenkin's parents in the book? There is little discussion of them as such, either, for all that this is an unauthorised biography.
While the plots of Powell's other books are often described in detail, the Dance remains a little more vague - it is not a readily described story, but surely a biographer could try somewhat? Some but not all characters from the Dance are mentioned, but not always explained, and those people whom Barber thinks contributed to them are noted, but again not always with an explaination or argument as to why he thinks so. An example is the character of Max Pilgrim,for whom Barber suggests a couple of real people as inspiration, but not Noel Coward, who is named in most other discussions of Pilgrim. There is little discussion of Powell's most memorable creation in the Dance, Widmerpool, about whom so much could be said.
Michael Barber's biography of Anthony Powell fails to inform the reader very much at all about Powell's life or the creation of his literary masterpiece, Dance to the Music of Time. We do learn some gossip about people in various literary, intellectual, and social cliques at the time, we are informed that Powell and his narrator were very similar, and that Powell looked for inspiration in his life for his work. Overall, one can only agree with Powell's own assesment of Barber - uninspiring, to say the least.
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