Edith Sitwell

Edith Sitwell

by VictoriaGlendinning (Author)

Synopsis

Not until her twenties was the real Edith Sitwell born. Freed from her unhappy home life she set up home in a shabby London flat: she became - almost overnight - one of the best-known 1920s pioneering poets. Her Plantagenet good looks attracted the photographer Cecil Beaton and the principal painters of the day. She befriended Aldous Huxley, T.S. Eliot, and Gertrude Stein. She rebuffed Wyndham Lewis and ardently loved the temperamental Russian painter, Pavel Tchelitchew. The thirties she spent in penury, writing her novels, poems and biographies and it was only when Yeats hailed her as 'a major poet' that her work reached a wider audience and she set off to conquer New York and Hollywood. In this vivid and sympathetic portrayal, drawing on Edith's brilliantly funny and often outrageous letters, Victoria Glendinning shows the spontaneous, gallant, yet tragically insecure woman behind the public image.

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More Information

Format: Paperback
Pages: 256
Edition: New e.
Publisher: Phoenix
Published: 02 Dec 1999

ISBN 10: 1857990773
ISBN 13: 9781857990775
Book Overview: The definitive biography of one of the most celebrated cultural figures of the twentieth century Winner of the Duff Cooper Prize and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for Biography By the author of the highly acclaimed Life of Trollope 'The excellence of Mrs Glendinning's book is that it remains wise and balanced while never sacrificing critical edge...It's hard to imagine a life of Edith Sitwell that could surpass it' John Carey, Sunday Times.

Author Bio
Victoria Glendinning is a freelance writer, well-known for her successful biographies and novels. She has won many prizes including the Whitbread Prize for Biography twice, the Duff Cooper Prize and the James Tait Black Prize. She is also President of English PEN and a Vice-President of the Royal Society of Literature. She lives in London, but travels widely, particularly to Provence and south-west Ireland.