Abstract
It is a narrative as old as those told about Odysseus, Aeneas, Adam and Eve, Joseph, Moses, the Viking warriors, and countless other uprooted souls set adrift into uncharted waters or expelled into barren deserts. Exile, that harsh, often brutal, state of perpetual and self-renewing loss, that ur-experience of most peoples, and of most individuals, sweeps through the drama of human experience, changing forever its contours and signs. No wonder that it constitutes a resonant, heart-rending theme articulated in so many of the traditions, both oral and written, that we call ‘literature’. When we think about exile within our own Western, Judaeo-Christian tradition, classic expressions of the theme spring readily to mind and loom large there: the Hebrew Scriptures, with particular emphasis on Genesis, Exodus, the Writings, the Prophets; the Odyssey; the Aeneid.
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A Bibliography of Writings by Anita Brookner
Novels
A Start in Life (London: Jonathan Cape, 1981. American edition: The Debut, New York: Linden, 1981; Vintage, 1985).
Providence (London: Jonathan Cape, 1982. New York: Pantheon, 1984).
Look At Me (London: Jonathan Cape, 1983. New York: Pantheon, 1983).
Hotel Du Lac (London: Jonathan Cape, 1984. New York: Pantheon, 1984).
Family and Friends (London: Jonathan Cape, 1985. New York: Pantheon, 1985).
A Misalliance (London: Jonathan Cape, 1986. American edition: The Misalliance, New York: Pantheon, 1986).
A Friend From England (London: Jonathan Cape, 1987. New York: Pantheon, 1988).
Latecomers (London: Jonathan Cape, 1988. New York: Pantheon, 1989).
Lewis Percy (London: Jonathan Cape, 1989. New York: Pantheon, 1990).
Brief Lives (London: Jonathan Cape, 1990. New York: Random House, 1991).
A Closed Eye (London: Jonathan Cape, 1991. New York: Random House, 1992).
Books
An Iconography of Cecil Rhodes (Oxford: The Trustees of Cecil Rhodes, 1956).
Waldemar George: Utrillo. Trans. by Brookner (London: Oldbourne Press, 1960).
Jean-Paul Crespelle: The Fauves. Trans. by Brookner (London: Oldbourne Press, 1962).
Maximilien Gauthier: Gauguin. Trans. by Brookner (London: Oldbourne Press, 1962).
Watteau (London: Hamlyn, 1968).
The Genius of the Future: Studies in French Art Criticism (London: Phaidon, 1971. New York: Phaidon, 1971; Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1988).
Greuze: The Rise and Fall of an Eighteenth-Century Phenomenon (London: Elek, 1972. Greenwich, CT and New York: Graphic Society, 1974).
Jacques-Louis David: A Personal Interpretation (London: Oxford University Press for the British Academy, 1974).
Jacques-Louis David (London: Chatto and Windus, 1980; London: Thames and Hudson, 1987. New York: Harper and Row, 1980).
‘Rigaud: Portrait of Louis XIV, 1681’, ‘Delacroix: Scenes from the Massacres at Chios, 1824’, ‘Ingres: The Turkish Bath, 1862’, ‘Cezanne: The Bathers, ca. 1900’, in Great Paintings, edited by Edwin Mullins (London: British Broadcasting Corporation, 1981; New York: St. Martin’s, 1981.)
Margaret Kennedy, Troy Chimneys, introduction by Brookner (London: Virago, 1985; New York: Penguin, 1985.)
Edith Templeton, The Island of Desire, introduction by Brookner (London: Hogarth, 1985.)
Edith Templeton, Summer in the Country, introduction by Brookner (London: Hogarth, 1985.)
Edith Templeton, Living on Yesterday, introduction by Brookner (London: Hogarth, 1986.)
The Stories of Edith Wharton: Selected and Introduced by Anita Brookner (Volume I. London and New York: Simon and Schuster, 1988).
The Stories of Edith Wharton: Selected and Introduced by Anita Brookner (Volume I. London and New York: Simon and Schuster, 1988).
Wharton, Edith. The Custom of the Country, introduction by Brookner (New York: Penguin, 1990).
Articles and Reviews
‘Rousseau and the Social Contract’, Times Literary Supplement (TLS) (8 February 1980): 149.
‘Corinne and Her Coups de Foudre’, TLS (14 March 1980): 287.
‘The Bibliotheque Nationale’, TLS (5 October 1984): 26.
‘A Fortune and a Name’ [Marthe, a Woman and Her Family: A Fin-de-Siecle Correspondence, edited by Frederick Brown], TLS (28 June 1985): 718–19.
‘The State-of-the-Art Crowd’ [Painters and Public Life in Eighteenth-Century Paris by Thomas E. Crow] TLS (29 November 1985): 1348.
‘At the Height of Her Powers’ [The Mother’s Recompense and Hudson River Bracketed, both by Edith Wharton], The Spectator (28 June 1986): 29–30.
‘The Bitter Fruits of Rejection’ [Barbara Pym by Robert Emmet Long], The Spectator (19 July 1986): 30–1.
‘In the Incomparable Spaces’ [Francois Boucher 1703–1770: Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais, Paris], TLS (10 October 1986): 1137.
‘Comedies of Good Manners’ [The Blush and Other Stories by Elizabeth Taylor], The Spectator (29 November 1986): 32–3.
‘Black Melancholy Mischief’ [The Stories of Muriel Spark], The Spectator (18 April 1987): 29–30.
‘A Stooge of the Spycatcher’, The Spectator (25 July 1987): 13–4.
‘The Madness of Art’ [Henry fames: A Life by Leon Edel], The Spectator (1 August 1987): 28–9.
‘Quietly Excellent and Very English’ [The Gooseboy by A. L. Barker], The Spectator (3 October 1987): 34.
‘Stupidity Is In the Head of the Beholder’ [Three Continents by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala], The Spectator (24 October 1987): 27–8.
‘Beneath the Surface’ [The Bonfire of the Vanities by Tom Wolfe], The Spectator (13 February 1988): 37–8.
‘Memory, Speak but Do Not Condemn’ [A Far Cry from Kensington by Muriel Spark], The Spectator (26 March 1988): 31–2.
‘The Importance of Being Alone’ [The School of Genius by Anthony Storr], The Spectator (25 June 1988): 39.
‘The Perils of Biography’ [Deceits of Time by Isabel Colegate], The Spectator (10 September 1988): 34–5.
‘New Interests in an Old Setting’ [Loving and Giving by Molly Keane], The Spectator (24 September 1988): 37.
‘Moscow Before the Revolution’ [The Beginning of Spring by Penelope Fitzgerald], The Spectator (1 October 1988): 29–30.
‘Prize-winning Novels from France’, The Spectator (10 December 1988): 39–40.
‘Not Decadent Enough’ [The Road from Decadence: From Brothel to Cloister: Selected Letters of J. K. Huysmans, edited and translated by Barbara Beaumont], The Spectator (18 February 1989): 29–30.
‘Men, Women and the Whole Damn Thing’ [The Grown-Ups by Victoria Glendinning], The Spectator (29 March 1989): 29–30.
‘As Natural as Breathing or Going for a Walk’ [Passing On by Penelope Lively], The Spectator (8 April 1989): 33.
‘Decline and Fall of a Dandy’ [Baudelaire by Claude Pichois], The Spectator (1 July 1989): 23–4.
‘Of Love and Death’ [Falling by Colin Thubron], The Spectator (16 September 1989): 43.
‘The Girls of Slender Connections’ [A Natural Curiosity by Margaret Drabble], The Spectator (30 September 1989): 35.
‘Without a Hint of Melancholy’ [Other People’s Trades by Primo Levi], The Spectator (7 October 1989): 34.
‘In Need of Considerable Gilding’ [The Fly in the Ointment by Alice Thomas Ellis], The Spectator (4 November 1989): 31.
‘Nostalgia for Something Awful’ [An Awfully Big Adventure by Beryl Bainbridge], The Spectator (9 December 1989): 37.
‘A Writer in Search of a Subject’ [The People and Uncollected Stories by Bernard Malamud], The Spectator (20 January 1990): 31–2.
‘The Appeal of Other People’s Awful Families’ [The Other Side by Mary Gordon], The Spectator (27 January 1990): 37.
‘Eminent Victorians and Others’ [Possession: A Romance by A. S. Byatt], The Spectator (3 March 1990): 3.
‘Rosamond Lehmann’, The Spectator (17 March 1990): 20–1.
‘… and Dangerous to Know’ [Chicago Loop by Paul Theroux], The Spectator (7 April 1990): 39.
‘Three Women and a Dragon’ [Three Times Table by Sara Maitland], The Spectator (14 April 1990): 33–4.
‘Straying into the Path of Real Danger’ [Lies of Silence by Brian Moore], The Spectator (21 April 1990): 31.
‘A Master Unraveller of Balls of String’ [Those in Peril by Nicolas Freeling], The Spectator (14 August 1990): 23.
‘Daisy Pulls It Off’ [The Gate of Angels by Penelope Fitzgerald], The Spectator (1 September 1990): 31–2.
‘Catastrophe But Not the Death of Hope’ [Brazzaville Beach by William Boyd], The Spectator (15 September 1990): 38.
The Different Ages of Women’ [Friend of My Youth by Alice Munro], The Spectator (20 October 1990): 37–8.
‘Ending the Heartache’ [Rabbit at Rest by John Updike], The Spectator (27 October 1990): 28–9.
‘Living in the Mirror City’ [Janet Frame: An Autobiography], The Spectator (24 November 1990): 39–40.
‘Prize-Winning French Novels’, The Spectator (5 January 1991): 27–8.
‘Portrait of the Hero as a Fallible Man’ [The Noble Savage: Jean-Jacques Rousseau: 1754–1762 by Maurice Cranston], Observer (24 February 1991): 63.
‘Sloughing Off Despair’ [Darkness Visible: A Memoir of Madness by William Styron], Observer (Sunday Section) (3 March 1991): 59.
‘Adventures of a Virile Woman’ [Colette: A Life by Herbert Lottman], Observer (Sunday Section) (10 March 1991): 60.
‘Unfortunate Women of Cambridge’ [Air and Angels by Susan Hill], The Spectator (30 March 1991): 28.
‘Alone in a Valuable House’ [Family Money], The Spectator (4 May 1991): 30.
The Battle of All Mothers’ [The Battle for Christabel by Margaret Forster], The Spectator (11 May 1991): 38.
‘More than Sugar and Spice’ [Wilderness Tips by Margaret Atwood], The Spectator (12 October 1991): 36–7.
A Bibliography of Writings about Anita Brookner Books
Sadler, Lynn Veach, Anita Brookner: Twayne’s English Authors Series (Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1990).
Articles and Reviews
Alexander, Fiona, ‘Anita Brookner: Providence and Hotel du Lac’, Contemporary Women Novelists (London: Edward Arnold, 1990) 30–4.
Banner, Simon, ‘Too Good to be True’, Guardian (4 September 1985): 22.
Bayles, Martha. ‘Romance a la Mode’ [Hotel du Lac], New Republic (25 March 1985): 37–8.
Dinnage, Rosemary, ‘Exiles’ [review of Latecomers by Anita Brookner and Baumgartner’s Bombay by Anita Desai], The New York Review of Books (1 June 1989): 34–6.
Epstein, Julia, ‘Images of Melancholy’, Washington Post Book World (24 July 1983): 6.
Gies, Judith, ‘An Anachronism in Love’ [Providence], The New York Times Book Review (18 March 1984): 17.
Glastonbury, Marion, ‘Sentimental Education’ [Providence], New Statesman (14 May 1982): 25.
Gross, John, ‘Hotel du Lac’, The New York Times (22 January 1985): C17.
Hale, Sheila, ‘Self Reflecting’, Saturday Review (May/June 1985): 35–8.
Hamilton, Alex, ‘Finding the Art of Fiction’, Guardian (27 May 1981): 12.
Hardy, Barbara, ‘A Cinderella’s Loneliness’, Times Literary Supplement (14 September 1984): 1019.
Hosmer, Robert E., Jr., ‘Anita Brookner’, The Dictionary of Literary Biography Yearbook ’87, 293–308.
Hosmer, Robert E., Jr., ‘A Virtuous Woman, Who Can Find?’ [Family and Friends] America (15 April 1986): 215–16.
Jebb, Julian, ‘Unblinking’ [Hotel du Lac], The Spectator (22 September 1984): 26–7.
Kenyon, Olga, ‘Anita Brookner’, in Women Novelists Today: A Survey of English Writing in the Seventies and Eighties (London and New York: St. Martin’s, 1988): 144–65.
Lasdun, James, ‘Pre-Modern, Post Modernist: Recent Fiction’ [Hotel du Lac], Encounter (February 1985): 42; 44–7.
Lee, Hermione, ‘Cleopatra’s Way’, Observer (9 September 1984): 22.
Lee, Hermione, ‘Drowning Tastefully in the Dark’ [Hotel du Lac], Los Angeles Times (20 March 1988): 2; 12.
Lee, Hermione, ‘A New Start in Life for Miss Brookner’, Observer (21 October 1984): 10.
Lopate, Phillip, ‘Can Innocence Go Unpunished?’ [Lewis Percy], The New York Times Book Review (11 March 1990): 10.
Moorehead, Caroline, ‘The Poet of Loneliness’, The Times (21 March 1983): 13.
Parrinder, Patrick, ‘Dreams of Avarice’ [A Closed Eye], London Review of Books (29 August 1991): 18.
Rubin, Merle, ‘Anita Brookner’s Novels: Old Moral Choices without the Old Rhetoric’, The Christian Science Monitor (1 March 1985): B3.
Rubin, Merle, ‘Casting Moral Puzzles: A Novelist on Her Craft’, The Christian Sciençe Monitor (1 March 1985): B3.
Sudrann, Jean, ‘Goings and Comings’ [Latecomers], The Yale Review 79, 3 (Spring 1990): 414–38.
Taubman, Robert, ‘Submission’ [Providence], London Review of Books (20 May-2 June 1982): 18–19.
Tyler, Anne, ‘A Solitary Life Is Still Worth Living’, New York Times Book Review (3 February 1985): 1, 31.
Wyatt-Brown, Anne M., ‘Creativity in Midlife: The Novels of Anita Brookner’, Journal of Aging Studies 3, 2 (1989): 175–81.
Interviews
Caldwell, Gail, ‘Anita Brookner’s Shy, Discerning Eye’, The Boston Globe (5 June 1989): 32–4.
Guppy, Shusha, ‘Interview: The Art of Fiction XCVII: Anita Brookner’, Paris Review, no. 109 (1987): 146–69.
Haffenden, John, ‘Anita Brookner’, Novelists In Interview (ed. John Haffenden) (London and New York: Methuen, 1985): 57–85.
Hughes-Hallett, Lucy, ‘Great Expectations’, The Observer (27 March 1983): 29.
Kenyon, Olga, ‘Anita Brookner’, Women Writers Talk (ed. Olga Kenyon) (New York: Carroll and Graf, 1990) 7–24.
Kolson, Ann, ‘Exploring the Hearts of Hopeful Romantics’, Philadelphia Inquirer, 4 March 1985, D1, D4.
‘Novelist With A Double Life’, unsigned interview, Observer (Sunday Section), 7 August 1988, 13.
Smith, Amanda, ‘Anita Brookner’, Publishers Weekly, 6 September 1985, 67–8.
Miscellaneous
Contemporary Authors, Volume 120, 57–62.
Contemporary Literary Criticism, Volume 32, 59–61.
Contemporary Literary Criticism, Volume 51, 58–66.
Contemporary Novelists, 142–3.
Dictionary of Literary Biography Yearbook 1984, 136–43.
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© 1993 Robert E. Hosmer Jr.
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Hosmer, R.E. (1993). Paradigm and Passage: The Fiction of Anita Brookner. In: Hosmer, R.E. (eds) Contemporary British Women Writers. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-22565-1_2
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