Friday 3 August 2012

indoors

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INTERVIEWER

Do you think it just to describe you as a reactionary?

WAUGH

An artist must be a reactionary. He has to stand out against the tenor of the age and not go flopping along; he must offer some little opposition. Even the great Victorian artists were all anti-Victorian, despite the pressures to conform.


I'm reading an awful lot about Evelyn Waugh for my dissertation and I think it's safe to say that I've never disagreed with a writer as much. However, I'm very lucky to do my reading - and gesture wildly and in silence - in my favourite spot in the library.

2 comments:

  1. I really enjoyed skimming Waugh's letters to Nancy Mitford...but I have a feeling a closer look would also result in silent gesticulating! How does he come into your dissertation? Can I ask for specifics?

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    Replies
    1. I'm looking at homosexuality and religion in Brideshead Revisited and Iris Murdoch's The Bell. Waugh's personal opinions on both subjects were quite, um, strong. And not very nice.

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