The Stranger's Child

by Alan Hollinghurst (Author), Alan Hollinghurst (Author)

• Used

  paperback
  

  $3.25

  In the late summer of 1913, George Sawle brings the charming, aristocratic young poet Cecil Valance to his family's modest home. The shared intimacies of this weekend link the Sawle and Valance families irrevocably, becoming legendary events in a larger story, told and interpreted in different ways over the coming century. Throughout this richly comic history of sexual mores and literary reputation we follow the two families, in a series of widely spaced episodes, through startling changes in fortune and circumstance. An impeccably nuanced exploration of changing taste, class and social etiquette, The Strange's Child, written in deliciously witty and observant prose, is an enthralling novel from one of the finest writers in the English language. 'With The Stranger's Child, an already remarkable talent unfurls into something spectacular' Sunday Times 'A remarkable, unmissable achievement ...One leaves the novel with a sense of the truly extraordinary' Independent 'Elegant, seductive and extremely enjoyable to read ...The Stranger's Child will no doubt be one of the best novels published this year' Guardian

• Used

  Paperback
  2011

  $5.81

  This is Alan Hollinghurst's first novel since The Line of Beauty , winner of the 2004 Man Booker Prize. In the late summer of 1913 the aristocratic young poet Cecil Valance comes to stay at 'Two Acres', the home of his close Cambridge friend George Sawle. The weekend will be one of excitements and confusions for all the Sawles, but it is on George's sixteen-year-old sister Daphne that it will have the most lasting impact, when Cecil writes her a poem which will become a touchstone for a generation, an evocation of an England about to change for ever. Linking the Sawle and Valance families irrevocably, the shared intimacies of this weekend become legendary events in a larger story, told and interpreted in different ways over the coming century, and subjected to the scrutiny of critics and biographers with their own agendas and anxieties. In a sequence of widely separated episodes we follow the two families through startling changes in fortune and circumstance. At the centre of this often richly comic history of sexual mores and literary reputation runs the story of Daphne, from innocent girlhood to wary old age. Around her Hollinghurst draws an absorbing picture of an England constantly in flux. As in The Line of Beauty , his impeccably nuanced exploration of changing taste, class and social etiquette is conveyed in deliciously witty and observant prose. Exposing our secret longings to the shocks and surprises of time, The Stranger's Child is an enthralling novel from one of the finest writers in the English language.

• Used

  Hardcover
  2011

  $4.20

  In the late summer of 1913 the aristocratic young poet Cecil Valance comes to stay at 'Two Acres', the home of his close Cambridge friend George Sawle. The weekend will be one of excitements and confusions for all the Sawles, but it is on George's sixteen-year-old sister Daphne that it will have the most lasting impact, when Cecil writes her a poem which will become a touchstone for a generation, an evocation of an England about to change for ever. Linking the Sawle and Valance families irrevocably, the shared intimacies of this weekend become legendary events in a larger story, told and interpreted in different ways over the coming century, and subjected to the scrutiny of critics and biographers with their own agendas and anxieties. In a sequence of widely separated episodes we follow the two families through startling changes in fortune and circumstance. At the centre of this often richly comic history of sexual mores and literary reputation runs the story of Daphne, from innocent girlhood to wary old age. Around her Hollinghurst draws an absorbing picture of an England constantly in flux. As in The Line of Beauty , his impeccably nuanced exploration of changing taste, class and social etiquette is conveyed in deliciously witty and observant prose. Exposing our secret longings to the shocks and surprises of time, The Stranger's Child is an enthralling novel from one of the finest writers in the English language.