[28] In an article written many years later, Waugh explained how the story became the basis for his next novel: "The idea [for the short story] came quite naturally from the experience of visiting a lonely settler [Christie] ... and reflecting how easily he could hold me prisoner. [62], Cunningham sees A Handful of Dust as a forerunner of Waugh's later, avowedly Catholic novels. [29], William Plomer, writing in The Spectator after the book's first publication, thought it mistaken "to regard Mr Waugh's more surprising situations as farcical or far-fetched; they are on the whole extremely realistic". The disorientation of being blinded and knowledgeable of your surroundings can instill fear. The house is a Victorian pseudo-Gothic pastiche described as architecturally "devoid of interest" by a local guide book and "ugly" by his wife, but is Tony's pride and joy. His friend, the journalist Tom Driberg agreed to place a notice in his "William Hickey" column in the Daily Express, in which Waugh accepted fully Oldmeadow's right to criticise the literary quality of the work "in any terms he thinks suitable". [60] However, the mixture of genres was not immediately understood or appreciated by some of Waugh's admirers; Connolly's initial thought was that Waugh had been "destroyed as a writer", by snobbery and association with country-house living. [88] Peter Quennell in the New Statesman found the story both painful and amusing—"tragedy and comedy are interdependent"—but was not overcome by the bouts of hilarity that had interrupted his reading of earlier novels such as Decline and Fall. The novel, which is often considered Waugh’s best, examines the themes of contemporary amorality and the death of spiritual values. The protagonist is Tony Last, a contented but shallow English country squire, who, having been betrayed by his wife and seen his illusions shattered one by one, joins an expedition to the Brazilian jungle, only to find himself trapped in a remote outpost as the prisoner of a maniac. When Tony awakes he learns that his hopes of rescue are gone, and that he is condemned to read Dickens to his captor indefinitely. The marriage of English country gentleman Tony Last and his wife Brenda is falling apart as Brenda begins an affair with social climber John Beaver. Chapter Two — Tony Last and his wife Brenda live at Hetton Abbey – a cold Gothic country house. Tony's singular fate in the jungle was first used by Waugh as the subject of an independent short story, published in 1933 under the title "The Man Who Liked Dickens". A Handful of Dust – plot summary. On being told that "John is dead", Brenda at first thinks that Beaver has died; on learning that it is her son John, she betrays her true feelings by uttering an involuntary "Thank God!". The wife's affair and a death in the family hasten the demise of an upper-class English marriage.Watch full movies for free. [3] Judi Dench won the BAFTA Award for Best Supporting Actress. [67] Thus, in the Brazilian jungle, Tony encounters what Davis terms "power without grace ... secular feudalism unredeemed by the saving grace of Christianity". However, A Handful of Dust is a novel that leaves a long-lasting impression and even evokes a feeling – if a reader is too sensitive – of dread. His professional successes coincided with private upheavals; in June 1928 he married Evelyn Gardner, but just over a year later the marriage ended when she declared her love for the couple's mutual friend John Heygate. It is aimed at inconsistency and hypocrisy. Tony withdraws from the divorce negotiations, and announces that he intends to travel for six months. A Handful of Dust by Evelyn Waugh, 1971, Dell Pub. It’s a popular book for studying satire and it’s well-received by critics. Jack Watling and Stephanie Beacham played Tony and Brenda Last, with Rex Holdsworth as Mr Todd. A HANDFUL OF DUST Evelyn Waugh. [5][6] Waugh's conversion did not greatly affect the acerbic and sharply satirical tone of his fiction—his principal characters were frequently amoral and their activities sometimes shocking. [21][22][n 1] Apart from using different names and some minor details this story is the same as the episode that Waugh later used as the climax to A Handful of Dust: an elderly settler (modelled in manner, speech and appearance on Christie), rescues and holds captive a lost explorer and requires him to read aloud the novels of Dickens, in perpetuity. The book has been dramatised for radio, stage and screen. On his return, he says, Brenda may have her divorce but without any financial settlement. [56] A later critic, John Cunningham, recognises that stylistically, the book is in a different category from Waugh's other 1930s novels, both more ambitious and more ambiguous. Todd nurses Tony back to health. A Handful of Dust (1988) cast and crew credits, including actors, actresses, directors, writers and more. [81] It has since been published in the United States by (among others) Dell Publishing (1959);[82] Little, Brown (1977);[83] and Barnes and Noble (2001). What is more, this novel will make us – readers – reconsider our core values in life. Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film three out of four stars and observed, "This is a peculiar movie, but a provocative one. In 1933–34 he travelled into the South American interior, and a number of incidents from the voyage are incorporated into the novel. [85], The initial critical response to the book, while largely complimentary in tone, was nevertheless muted and sparse. [1] His first commercially printed work was a short story, "The Balance", which Chapman and Hall included in a 1926 anthology. Tony is shattered, but initially agrees and intends to provide her with £500 a year. [95] A new radio adaptation, with Jonathan Cullen and Tara Fitzgerald in the main roles, was broadcast as a two-part serial in May 1996. A Handful Of Dust tells the story of three ranching families fighting to save their way of life in the face of devastating cultural, economic and environmental obstacles they cannot control. First published in 1934, it is often grouped with the author's early, satirical comic novels for which he became famous in the pre-World War II years. Published in 1934, A Handful of Dust is a satirical novel that offers a social perspective of life among the upper classes in England in the early twentieth century. After attending Lancing College and Hertford College, Oxford, Waugh taught for three years in a series of private preparatory schools before beginning his career as a writer. A Handful Of Dust tells the story of three ranching families fighting to save their way of life in the face of devastating cultural, economic and environmental obstacles they cannot control. I was warned in a vision of your approach". [34] The critic Cyril Connolly, whose first reaction to the work had been negative, later called it "the only book which understands the true horror of the withdrawal of affection in an affair from [the point of view of] the innocent party". James Wilby stars as a country gentleman, Tony Last, who loves rattling around his expansive estate, Hetton Abbey. On learning the extent of her deception Tony is shattered, but agrees to protect Brenda's social reputation by allowing her to divorce him, and to provide her with £500 a year. When Tony awakes he learns that his hopes of rescue have gone and that he is condemned to read Dickens to his captor indefinitely. [66], Tony's doomed quest in the Brazilian jungle is framed in biblical terms; the relevant chapter title, "In Search of a City" alludes to Hebrews 13:14: "For here we have no continuing city, but we seek one to come". Bringing together artworks and documents, the exhibition traces a visual journey through the motif of dust from aerial reconnaissance, wartime destruction and natural disasters to domestic dirt and forensics. A Handful of Dust is a devastatingly funny book that gives a glimpse into British society between the wars. ", Evelyn Waugh in 1946, answering questions from American readers. [57] However, Waugh remarked of the novel that it was "humanist, and said all I wanted to say about humanism". The illiterate Mr. Todd has a collection of the novels of Charles Dickens, which Tony reads to him. By the end of 1932 Waugh had written two further novels, Vile Bodies and Black Mischief, and two travel books. English aristocrat Tony Last (James Wilby) welcomes tragedy into his life when he invites John Beaver (Rupert Graves) to visit his vast estate. A Handful Of Dust is the core duo of Bruce Russell and Alastair Galbraith, with the regular percussive under-pinning of Peter Stapleton. This amount would require Tony to give up Hetton Abbey, his beloved Victorian Gothic house and estate. [8] Waugh, wrote Oldmeadow, "was intent on elaborating a work outrageous not only to Catholic but to ordinary standards of modesty". [93] In the Modern Library's list of 100 best novels, A Handful of Dust is placed 34th in the "Board list", although unplaced in the complementary "Readers' List". In 1942 the American critic Alexander Woollcott chose it as the best English novel in 100 years,[92] a verdict largely endorsed some years later by Frank Kermode. First published in 1934, it is often grouped with the author's early, satirical comic novels for which he became famous in the pre-World War II years. [87] The novel's critical standing grew steadily in the years following its publication. [2] He worked briefly as a Daily Express reporter,[3] and wrote a short biography of the pre-Raphaelite painter Dante Gabriel Rossetti before achieving success in 1928 with the publication of his comic novel, Decline and Fall. [55] Likewise Gerald Gould in The Observer, reviewing the book's initial publication in 1934: "Here was the old gorgeous, careless note of contempt and disillusionment. [79] Thus, Tony's devotion is shown to be to a false ideal; his deposition and replacement in his domain by middle-class heirs represents what the writer Brigid Brophy terms "a bourgeois sack of a fake-Gothic Rome". Commentators have, however, drawn attention to its serious undertones, and have regarded it as a transitional work pointing towards Waugh's Catholic postwar fiction. Precipitated by the failure of Waugh’s marriage and by his conversion to Roman Catholicism, the It stars James Wilby and Kristin Scott Thomas. [62], In 2010 Time magazine placed A Handful of Dust in its listing of the hundred best English-language novels published since 1923 (the year the magazine began publication), stating: "If this is Waugh at his bleakest it’s also Waugh at his deepest, most poisonously funny". [46] Waugh, says his biographer Martin Stannard, was "dredging the memory of his personal agony" in documenting the breakdown of the Lasts' marriage. [1] At the same time, Waugh was undergoing instruction which led to his reception, in September 1930, into the Roman Catholic Church. 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