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Every Man for Himself

Beryl Bainbridge

3.49 · Rating details · 1,314 ratings · 156 reviews

The sinking of the world's greatest luxury liner, the invincible and magnificent S. S. Titanic, has captured people's attention ever since that tragic April night in 1912, when 1500 people lost their lives. And no one has better dramatized this memorable event than Beryl Bainbridge in Every Man for Himself.

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Paperback, 224 pages

Published September 12th 1997 by Da Capo Press (first published 1996)

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· 1,314 ratings · 156 reviews

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Nov 19, 2018 Hugh rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: modern-lit, mm2019, booker-shortlist, read-2018

The story of the maiden voyage of the Titanic is a familiar one, but Bainbridge still managed an impressively fresh reimagination of the personal experiences of a rich young Anglo-American who has been adopted by the family of J.P. Morgan. His journey is somewhat picaresque - he spends most of the voyage scheming, drinking, gambling and chasing women, and any heroic qualities he has only emerge near the end(view spoiler) ...more

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Jun 02, 2017 Sara rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: borrowed-from-library, historical-fiction

There is something endlessly fascinating about the sinking of the Titanic. Perhaps it is the idea that people were going about their business, enjoying their lives, until hours before they were suddenly swept away into oblivion. Perhaps it is the number of blunders that contributed to this disaster and how easily most of them could have been avoided. Perhaps it is the feeling you get that certain events are destined and nothing could prevent it happening, or the indiscriminate way some people su ...more

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May 17, 2013 Susan rated it really liked it · review of another edition

This short, almost restrained, novel was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and won the Whitbread Prize when published in 1996. It tells the story of Morgan, a relative of J.P. Morgan, who feels, "destined to be a participant rather than a spectator of singular events". When a man dies in his arms shortly before he is to return to the States, he leaves his uncle's house almost secretly (a stolen picture of his mother tucked away) and gets the milk train to Southampton. For the young man is surely ...more

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Jul 10, 2012 GoldGato rated it it was ok

Shelves: fiction, winter, maritime

This book puzzled me. How can you screw up the Titanic story? But it just did nothing for me, which seems to put my review in the minority. Lots of bland talk, blah blah blah blah. Yup, way to make the greatest maritime incident in history bee-oar-ing...with three syllables. I had to smack myself awake.

Book Season = Winter (maybe the cold will lead you to a gentle sleep)

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Feb 01, 2010 Courtney Johnston rated it really liked it

Shelves: fiction

I wonder if reading this book before Cameron's calculated tear-jerker came out was even more affecting than it was reading it afterwards. Like re-reading Pride & Prejudice this days and trying to keep the text separate from the filmic palimpsest that's layered over top of it, reading 'Every Man for Himself' without seeing Kate and Leonardo running about the place is almost impossible.

The protagonist - an un-named young man closely but mysteriously attached to J Pierpont Morgan - also reminde

...more

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Jun 05, 2016 Trelawn rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Bainbridge is definitely becoming a favourite. In this short novel she chronicles the fate of the passengers of the Titanic on their doomed voyage to New York. She focuses mainly on the first class passengers (some real, some fictional). Bainbridge lays bare the secrets and relationships of the rich and privileged as they cross the ocean to return to wives or family or to embark on their career. The tragedy of the Titanic remains in the background for much of the narrative with the characters bl ...more

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Sep 10, 2015 Mary rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

A very moving account of the privileged few aboard the doomed first and only voyage of Titanic, the unsinkable ship.
Beautifully written, you could almost feel the chill in the air and see the stars above!
The last few pages have you drawn into the despair and for some that were still convinced the ship wouldn't sink and just carried on.
Recommended even if one knows what happens.
The writing is exquisite!

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May 16, 2012 Bruce MacBain rated it it was ok

This is a fictionalized account of the sinking of the Titanic, originally published in 1996 and now reissued, as have been so many other books on the subject, to coincide with the centenary of the disaster. Beryl Bainbridge was a distinguished writer and this book either won, or was a finalist for, a number of prestigious awards. It is with some diffidence, then, that I confess that I didn’t like it. The book is nine-tenths over before the ship hits the iceberg and I found myself increasingly im ...more

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Jan 11, 2010 Priya rated it really liked it

This is one of the most tightly written books I've ever read. With not one superfluous word, Bainbridge advances the story at an impressive pace and creates tension in a situation where we know the inevitable outcome.

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Dec 09, 2017 Rebecca rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: booker-shortlisted, historical-fiction, maritime-adventure

The voyage of the Titanic as seen through the eyes of an adopted nephew of J.P. Morgan. “I was destined to be a participant rather than a spectator of singular events,” he states. I had some trouble keeping his fellow passengers straight, but I enjoyed the little moments of dramatic irony where people are joking about accidents and praising the ship’s stability. The whole book is strangely detached given its focus on a famous tragedy, but the last chapter, and especially the last paragraph, are ...more

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Aug 28, 2015 Jennifer rated it liked it

Shelves: 2015

I always think I like Beryl Bainbridge's writing. Then I read one of her books and I find myself struggling to stay engaged and I wonder what is wrong with me - because it can't be her. She's Beryl Bainbridge and I'm just me. It must be me.

I had moments of enjoyment but this was one of those books that once it was put down I had to do a little mental battle to pick it up again. Perhaps it's not a good choice when you're on holiday and there is so much else going on that is fun and distracting?

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Aug 27, 2014 Philip rated it liked it

The multiple Oscar-winning film, Titanic, appeared in 1997. Whether Beryl Bainbridge’s novel, Every Man For Himself, was already in the planning before that movie was cenceived is a matter open to conjecture or the biographer. Even if the novelist chose the subject deliberately to coincide with the launch of a blockbuster, the novel has to be read on its own considerable merits, which did indeed include a Whitbread Prize, a nomination for a Booker and a Commonwealth Writer’s Prize. The book’s su The multiple Oscar-winning film, Titanic, appeared in 1997. Whether Beryl Bainbridge’s novel, Every Man For Himself, was already in the planning before that movie was cenceived is a matter open to conjecture or the biographer. Even if the novelist chose the subject deliberately to coincide with the launch of a blockbuster, the novel has to be read on its own considerable merits, which did indeed include a Whitbread Prize, a nomination for a Booker and a Commonwealth Writer’s Prize. The book’s subject matter, however, might at first sight, and especially now that we are so familiar with the feature film, suggest repetition or mere cliché. After all, what more is there to be said about an event that has already been done to death in multimedia? In attempting such a project, a novelist of the stature of Beryl Bainbridge might have run the risk of being seen to court populism or, even, worse, triteness. But Every Man For Himself succeeds. It transcends all such possible criticism by virtue of its refined literary style, the subtlety of its characters and ultimately the credibility of its scenario.

The bones of the Titanic story are covered, but unlike the feature film they do not form the very gist of the spectacle. Despite one of the book’s characters having been involved in the ship’s design and construction, here we are spared redundant detail of dimension, quantity and material. This is not a novel about a ship, despite the almost continual sense of visual opulence that pervades the experience. On the contrary, this is a novel about the people on board, or more accurately a particular class, who sailed in her. In Beryl Bainbridge’s novel we are among the upper crust, or at least those who aspire to join them, many decks above the steerage who, just like they do anywhere, populate a level of society that the ‘comfortable’ know to exist but only rarely acknowledge.

Thus Every Man For Himself, despite its brevity, successfully addresses the vast minefield of British social class relations. At the start of this voyage, those class relations seem to be rigidly contrasted in lower versus upper decks, in steerage dorms versus plush cabins. And these differences are not merely economic, since identity and assumption are also in play. But when crisis materialises, the price of a passenger’s ticket contributes nothing towards the ability to survive. A vision of new equality arises when, clearly, the planned facilities cannot cope, and never could have doped, since those who conceived the boat could not conceive of its demise.

But it is in the book’s metaphorical mode that this short novel transcends and exceeds much of what has been written or shot about the fate of the Titanic. In the same way that the ship’s designers could not conceive of a collision so catastrophic that it might sink an unsinkable vessel, perhaps those who assumed existing class relations were permanent could also not conceive of a war so devastating it would ruin a continent and simply erase convention. It was not just a ship that sank on this voyage, but also the rigid societal divisions that inspired its very design.

Of course we already know the plot of Every Man For Himself. Eventually even the book’s scenario makes sense. But the real danger of writing such a novel is that it becomes subservient to those events we already know, destined merely to repeat them. But Beryl Bainbridge is several cuts above this class of writer and the book transcends the familiar to address universal themes simply through its intense study of character. Thus clichés, even the less obvious, are all avoided.
...more

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Sep 16, 2012 Perry Whitford rated it really liked it · review of another edition

An adoptee of the banker JP Morgan with an orphaned, uncertain past, takes first-class passage on the maiden, and of course only, voyage of the RMS Titanic.

Spent largely in the company of bankers, magnates, and his flighty friends -a vacuous bunch of young socialites, gauche sons and daughters of the great and good- he also comes into contact with members of the working-class from amongst the crew.

As the ship sails inevitably towards disaster, the callow narrator becomes increasingly in thrall An adoptee of the banker JP Morgan with an orphaned, uncertain past, takes first-class passage on the maiden, and of course only, voyage of the RMS Titanic.

Spent largely in the company of bankers, magnates, and his flighty friends -a vacuous bunch of young socialites, gauche sons and daughters of the great and good- he also comes into contact with members of the working-class from amongst the crew.

As the ship sails inevitably towards disaster, the callow narrator becomes increasingly in thrall to an enigmatic businessman called Scurra who, alongside the horrific incidents that followed the breaching and sinking of that fateful ship, illustrates to him some fundamental facts of life, best incapsulated in Bainbridge's chosen title.

As with any novel set on the Titanic, the ironies come thick and heavy. The socialites toast their youth and the joy of being alive, make some sport with supposed omens, even start a book on the estimated arrival time at New York "barring accidents", which gets a laugh.

Then there are the occasional details of people and objects which were due to travel but didn't, such as JP Morgan himself and his art collection, "all those wonderful Rubenses and Rembrandts" which a change of plan saved for posterity.

And lastly, we get the seemingly incredulous (yet historically true) behaviour of some of the passengers as the end approaches, continuing their games of cards regardless, dancing the foxtrot as the orchestra plays on while the waters rush round, indulging in childish tiffs, rendered all the more pathetic by the gravity of the real crisis at hand.

For all that though, Every Man for Himself is not really about the Titanic. Don't get me wrong, it tells the story of the sinking sure enough, and there are some highly visual scenes which would make for a stunning cinematic experience to knock spots off Cameron's overblown clunker (most especially when the narrator is finally washed into the waves), but the death of the ship is secondary to the death of something more personal, the narrator's illusions.

That's a difficult narrative undertaking when the drama of the disaster far outweighs any individual rites of passage, but Bainbridge is a bold, brilliant writer with a keen intelligence behind all she does, so against the odds she pulls it off. ...more

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Dec 31, 2014 Sarah rated it liked it · review of another edition

Narrated by a young man called Morgan who is related to J P Morgan who owned the shipping line. Morgan is rich, aimless and seems to attract tragedy. Mysteries about the Titanic and also the passengers surround the few days of the voyage. The sinking of the Titanic was brilliantly written. The calmness of the water, the slow unfolding of events. Written mostly from the first class point of view and captures their tight-knit, elitist world. The novel concentrates on their lives and the disaster i ...more

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Jan 22, 2009 Graceann rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: historical-fiction

Please see my detailed review at Amazon Graceann's "Every Man for Himself" Review"

Please click that the review was helpful to you at Amazon so that my rating continues to climb!

Quite a letdown after the excellent prose in Testament of Youth. No character development and nobody worth caring about. I'm glad it was such a short book so that I didn't waste any more time on it than necessary.

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Sep 12, 2011 Hollie added it

Not the best book I've ever read, really hard going, I found that I didn't really care about the characters. I wanted to read about the Titanic, not a side story and then the last 80 pages or so of when it sank. I love reading about the Titanic but there wasn't enough about it in the book, to be honest it could have been set anywhere. The last few pages where it got to the part about the ship sinking was really good, just a shame about the rest of the book.

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Jul 03, 2012 Lisa Matheny rated it did not like it

This stunk. I just didn't care for or about the characters. I tried to read it or over 70 pages and realized life is short and I shouldn't waste another minute trying to gather interest for her characters. Don't waste your time reading this drivel. I didn't finish the book. I have more important things to do like visit the lavatory.

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May 06, 2012 Nancy rated it it was ok

This book sadly bored me, though it did leave me curious about some of the details of the Titanic. The characters were not compelling.

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Nov 15, 2018 Jo rated it liked it · review of another edition

3.5 stars

The Titanic hasn’t held the same fascination for me as I believe it has for others, I’ve never even seen the film as, after all, we all know the ending. Going into this book, therefore, I was interested in the direction Beryl Bainbridge would take, would else she could add to the story that hasn’t been done before.

We follow Morgan, nephew, although indirectly, of J.P Morgan as he embarks on the maiden voyage of the Titanic, going home to New York to perhaps finally decide at twenty-one, 3.5 stars

The Titanic hasn’t held the same fascination for me as I believe it has for others, I’ve never even seen the film as, after all, we all know the ending. Going into this book, therefore, I was interested in the direction Beryl Bainbridge would take, would else she could add to the story that hasn’t been done before.

We follow Morgan, nephew, although indirectly, of J.P Morgan as he embarks on the maiden voyage of the Titanic, going home to New York to perhaps finally decide at twenty-one, what he wants to do with his life. He and his other young, primarily male, wealthy friends spend their few days abroad the boat, carousing, arguing, dining and gossiping amongst the other wealthy first class passengers on board. Morgan is not your average dilettante as is shown when his background is fleshed out and explored throughout the novel and he associates with staff and a steerage passenger on the ship whose lives, despite his efforts to bond, are so different from his own.

I lost my patience, however, with the frivolity and snobbery of Morgan and his friends, there are constant references to people ‘knowing their place’ which riled me and despite hints that Morgan is more than this, different from his friends, I’m not sure I was convinced. His character almost seems a caricature of what a young man would be at the time, lines like ‘She’s only a girl but her intelligence is formidable’ and ‘I like people to know their place, just as long as I’m not required to step on them.’ In hindsight, I wondered if this emphasis on class was intended to show that class only takes us so far as when disaster strikes there is a great equalization but the escape efforts from the ship show that even then class played a part.

The other aspect of the novel that irritated me was the constant ironic references to the disaster with characters saying, “To be young, to be lucky enough to be here at such a time”, and when discussing the arrival time, “Tuesday night, yes. Barring accidents,” at which they both laughed’ as well as the ‘omens’ and other prescient lines that are too many to mentioned.
There are some intriguing characters on board, Scurra, Adele and Rosenfelder, and the ships architect Thomas Andrews and there are scenes played out that keep the story not simply a tale of a disaster at sea. Beryl Bainbridge also does a wonderful job of describing the ship and the design, at least of the first class decks, the grand staircase, the details and luxury. This is very much a novel about a certain class of people and their experience of the disaster and when it finally happens the chapter is as intense as you would expect, actually quite hard to read.

I was intrigued as to how much of the novel was based in fact knowing very little about the details and went down a Wikipedia hole of searching for information. What struck me was not only that Bainbridge had clearly done her research but the facts I found out about the disaster, why the ship may have crumpled so easily, why there were so few lifeboats, the rescue and the survivors and how the disaster changed maritime rules and operations. The title of the novel implies a free for all when the ship struck ice but this doesn’t seem to be what occurred although force did have to be used and instead the phrase is used by Scurra to justify his selfishness in relationships. This enigmatic character is definitely one of the strongest in the novel but is not the only one to whom hidden depths can be attributed. The fact that we don’t find out more just accentuates the tragedy of the disaster, that 1500 lives were lost in one terrible night.

Some Favorite lines

‘There is no way of knowing how one will react to danger until faced with it. Nor can we know what capacity we have for nobility and self-sacrifice unless something happens to rouse such conceits into activity.’

‘Brief as the moment had been we had nonetheless clearly seen the awesome monster rearing on splayed legs from the glittering avenue below, its gigantic head vibrating inside its steel helmet, its thunderous intestines of lubricated pistons and crank-shafts pounding and pumping in perpetual motion.’
...more

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Jan 06, 2019 Rebecca rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: to-be-read

From the beginning it’s clear how these four days aboard RMS Titanic will end.

Morgan (wealthy adopted nephew of a rich banker) has a foot in two camps - first class passenger and a minor role in the design team.

Flaying between social position, purpose and possibly romance Morgan me Scurra. Philosopher, investigator and possible doctor, Scurra makes many claims and explanations throughout the story, which Morgan clings to.

The shifting world political scene is reflected in the human interaction ...more

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Nov 02, 2014 Mark Hebden rated it it was amazing

Shelves: fiction

A disclaimer! I don’t claim to have brilliant taste in movies and so Titanic by James Cameron is one of my favourites. When I was 17 and in the first throes of love, the film gave me an insight in to another world both opulent and past and this book by Beryl Bainbridge has just done the same thing once again. The power of the word as well as the image to conjure up something magical should never be underestimated but the setting is where the similarity ends between book and film.

Every Man For H A disclaimer! I don’t claim to have brilliant taste in movies and so Titanic by James Cameron is one of my favourites. When I was 17 and in the first throes of love, the film gave me an insight in to another world both opulent and past and this book by Beryl Bainbridge has just done the same thing once again. The power of the word as well as the image to conjure up something magical should never be underestimated but the setting is where the similarity ends between book and film.

Every Man For Himself is a rich satire of upper class existence that could have leaked out of the pen of Evelyn Waugh himself. The characters, though for the most part real people long gone, are dealt with brutally by the author as shallow, vacuous types, intent on living a debauched life of intoxication, ignorance (blissful or otherwise) and decadence. They feel little shame, lack morality and human decency and are an illuminated image of the bright young things of the British and American elite before the First World War.

The book centres around a distant, fictional relation to the financier J P Morgan who describes himself as being central to events rather than seeing them happen. He is a man finding himself and is still unsure of what his future should be; keen to listen to his betters but keen as well to forge his own path but lacking the wherewithal to do so. Sexually inexperienced and socially retarded, we almost sympathise with him, an almost that appears not for any other central character.

The satire develops grandly among the corridors and restaurants of the luxurious upper decks with small references every once in a while to unsinkability and “the future” for those whom we know [spoiler alert] will soon perish in the freezing black hollow of the Atlantic Ocean.
Two things are key to the story – the steerage classes are largely absent from the narrative, showing the absolute obliviousness the central characters have to the majority of the passengers on board. Their lack of acknowledgement of their fellow human beings, even towards the end is in passing and brief and this is mirrored deliberately in the plot. Secondly, and refreshingly, the sinking of the ship does not take centre stage; it is not until the final 50 or so pages that we learn of the ship hitting an iceberg, once we are fully invested (or not) in the characters and their purposeless lives.

One interesting part of the book is the references to J P Morgan’s real life absence from the Titanic’s maiden voyage for which is was scheduled to attend. Along with other small references to certain pieces of the ship being labelled with “RMS Olympic”, Titanic’s sister ship suggests that Bainbridge may subscribe to the famed conspiracy theory which suggests J P Morgan deliberately had the ship sunk. The story goes that the Olympic had collided with a Naval ship not long before and was permanently damaged but the captain was also at fault for the incident so Lloyds refused to pay out on the insurance claim. Morgan then has the Olympic repainted as the Titanic and sank it while the actual Titanic lived on under the name Olympic. The theory gains ground when we’re told the fellow bankers and financiers that were on board happened to be all the ones opposing Morgan’s plan to create a Federal Reserve Bank, and that Morgan not only didn’t go on the journey but advised several friends not to go aboard. He also had a selection of works of art he was supposed to be transporting to the US removed from the ship at the last minute. Mine is not to suggest any truth to this, merely to point out that it is alluded to in the book.

If you are looking for a rip-roaring tale of derring-do at sea; heroism and romance then this is not a book you will enjoy. If you are looking for expert mockery of class on its last legs set against the backdrop of one of the worst peacetime maritime disasters in history then you will love it. I did; it has subtlety, grace, power, disgust and empathy and if, like me, you find the whole Titanic story alluring then it will envelop you wholly as it did me.
...more

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Sep 05, 2012 Karo rated it really liked it

There was a film on the BBC a few years ago that nearly broke my heart. Beryl Bainbridge, then 70, was convinced she was going to die within the year, given that both her parents had died at 71. Her nephew made a film of those "last" months, following her around London and her hometown, Liverpool. It was beautiful and incredibly sad to see the old lady, wheezing yet still chain-smoking, revisit her past. It turned out she had the dates wrong, and she did not die that year, but that was hardly th There was a film on the BBC a few years ago that nearly broke my heart. Beryl Bainbridge, then 70, was convinced she was going to die within the year, given that both her parents had died at 71. Her nephew made a film of those "last" months, following her around London and her hometown, Liverpool. It was beautiful and incredibly sad to see the old lady, wheezing yet still chain-smoking, revisit her past. It turned out she had the dates wrong, and she did not die that year, but that was hardly the point. It's rare to be allowed a frank view of how our heroes and heroines deal with age and death. Someone not familiar with her writing would probably have chosen not to see behind the weirdness of that story, but having read a fair bit of her work, I saw the same eccentricity that pervades it, and loved her even more. And the way she chatted about the stories that made her, you could tell she was an expert storyteller.

Every Man For Himself, then, was always going to be a wonderful piece of writing. I think it helped that I don't know much about the historical background of this short novel. Yes, that's right, people, I have never seen Titanic! I know the facts from the wonderful exhibit in Liverpool's Maritime Museum, and that's pretty much it. But I know how Beryl Bainbridge deals with history, and that is not the way the movie did. (Hence some slightly disappointed reviews on goodreads.)

The novel starts in medias res, and for a few pages, I had no idea what was going on. After a while it turns out the story is seen through the eyes of Morgan, the adopted nephew of millionaire J.P. Morgan, who struggles with both his past and his future on his way back to his family in America. Surrounded by his peers, all young, rich and carefree, he is drawn to a mysterious trio of people he first sees while waiting to board the Titanic on her maiden voyage. Scurra, the most mysterious of them all, seems to know everyone on board and catches Morgan unaware by analysing his fears and illusions, heightening Morgan's depression and unease. All the while, the Titanic steams towards disaster...

The obvious genius of the novel is that everybody knows what will happen in the end, and every little detail gains significance, from snippets of conversations about bad omens to the way the people on the upper deck seem utterly bored with their lives, yet they will be the ones to survive. Bainbridge has a field day playing with the readers' knowledge of events. She weaves little facts into the fictional story, and everything seems completely believable. I can see how people looking for the big drama would be disappointed up until the last few pages, which managed to choke me quite a bit, but I loved the way Bainbridge stubbornly focussed on Morgan's point of view. As in any good story, he does grow and learn, and it's mostly thanks to the mysterious and not altogether likeable Scurra, who plays the role of a Mephistopheles. (See, I'm so proud of making all those links. I spare you my "Master and Margarita" theory.) In conversation with him, Morgan discovers and begins to doubt his morals and convictions, and in the end sees his peers and (adopted) class for what it is - something that stubbornly clings to the splendour of the sinking ship and ultimately lacks the willpower to swim to safety.

Every Man For Himself is a short novel, and a beautifully understated one. There are so many aspects that could have been elaborated. But the Titanic's journey was a short one, and Beryl Bainbridge manages to cram just as much life, death, questions, doubts, mysteries and tragedies into a short novel. It's a work of art. The movie, on the other hand, had Celine Dion... ...more

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Aug 29, 2013 Val rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: booker-prizes, womens-prize

Beryl Bainbridge was very good at writing fictional accounts of historic events. This one is about the maiden voyage and sinking of the Titanic. The characters, conversations and situations she creates blend smoothly into the true story.
The Booker shortlist for 1996 had some very good books on it, this was one of them.
Last Orders (which won),
A Fine Balance (my favourite),
Alias Grace (one of Atwood's best),
Every Man for Himself
and two I have not read, but have been told are also good,
Reading in t ...more

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Apr 16, 2014 Terri rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 2014

This book was only OK. Perhaps it simply didn't meet my expectations. I read many comments about the author's skill as a writer prior to reading the book and really did expect something ... different. The book is primarily character driven, but I had a hard time caring about any of the characters. It is a shallow look at the shallow lives of very wealthy first-class passengers. Steerage class passengers hardly note a mention as though not worth the paper and ink. I guess this could be a clever d ...more

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May 22, 2013 NancyHelen rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Yet another book about the sinking of the Titanic, although this was told in the first person view of J. Pierpont Morgan who is 22 at the time and wrestling with his own status and future. The majority of the book is set in the four days of sailing leading up to the sinking. It tells about the intrigues, dramas and romances within the first class passengers and reads a bit like a novel of upper class lifestyle. But it is carefully and cleverly contrasted to the final section where the ship goes ...more

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Jul 03, 2010 Fred rated it really liked it

Just like the other Bainbridge books I've read, this is a short tale dense with sharp observations and moments of odd, often dark humor. In this case, the narrator is a disaffected member of the upper class, and his viewpoint allows us to observe the behavior of the wealthy passengers of the Titanic as the inevitable tragedy looms.

More than for plot, I enjoy Bainbridge's books for their regular servings of commentary on the human condition. I often find myself stopping to ponder some assertion o ...more

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Mar 08, 2013 Bernadette Robinson rated it liked it

Shelves: slow-burner, reading-group-read, based-on-factual-events

This was an easy enough read and I felt that the atmosphere of the whole event surrounding the Titanic and everything was captured quite well but in some ways I found it lacking if I'm honest. I gave it a 3 stars on there but would probably give it 5/10.

I will try another of her books if I come across one in order to compare them.

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Jan 01, 2012 Alex Lewis rated it it was ok

The author won the 1996 UK Whitbread award for the year's best novel. It's one more account of the Titanic disaster, nothing particularly unique or distinguishing.

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Mar 30, 2017 Brona's Books rated it liked it · review of another edition

Peopled by fictional characters who mixed with actual first class passengers and crew, Bainbridge explored the nature of class and courage and integrity, all mixed up with foolishness and snobbery and the mundane.

Mystery abounds, there are puzzling characters, snatches of overheard conversations, loads of drinking and buffoonery. Our narrator, Morgan spends a lot of time philosophising and pondering his future (even though the story is actually told from this future Morgan's perspective). He is ...more

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Jul 16, 2015 A. Suiter Clarke rated it liked it

Last week, I picked up Beryl Bainbridge's Whitbread Novel Award-winning Every Man for Himself: a short, dramatic novel set on the doomed RMS Titanic. Through the eyes of an orphan-turned-rich-upper-class man in his early twenties, we see the days leading up to the great ship's demise in the Atlantic.

Let me just say, I, like many others, am quite obsessed by the Titanic story. I am also incredibly freaked out by the coincidences associated with a novel written 14 years before the ship ever took i ...more

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About Beryl Bainbridge

Beryl Bainbridge

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Dame Beryl Margaret Bainbridge DBE was an English writer from Liverpool. She was primarily known for her works of psychological fiction, often set among the English working classes. Bainbridge won the Whitbread Award twice and was nominated for the Booker Prize five times. In 2008, The Times newspaper named Bainbridge among their list of "The 50 greatest British writers since 1945".