Good Company: Diaries 1967-1970: Volume 5

Diaries of Frances Partridge #5

by Frances Partridge

Francis Partridge's diaries are the record of a woman who not only participated in the lives of the legendary Bloomsbury group, but was the circle’s oldest surviving member until her death in 2004. Good Company opens up Frances Partridge's life between 1967 and 1970, as she attempts "to get a better seat on [my] bicycle." Confronted by times of great adversity, she refuses to indulge in self pity. A patient listener to other people's troubles, she can also be pungently outspoken in her criticism of her friends and their beliefs, in the name of truth. Her thirst for travel and her love of her friends are inexhaustible. In this volume she goes to Sicily with Rosamond Lehmann, to Spain to visit Gerald Brenan after the death of his wife, to Italy with Bunny Garnett, and to Cyprus with Heywood and Anne Hill.

Genres: Memoir

272 pages, Paperback

First published December 31, 1994

About the author

Frances Partridge CBE was the last surviving member of the Bloomsbury Group. She is most known for her diaries.

Her father was William Cecil Marshall, architect and runner-up in the very first Wimbledon tournament. She was the sister of Ray Garnett and Thomas Marshall.

Reviews

[Paulo Santos · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's always a pleasure to go back to Frances Partridge's diaries. For several reasons: I really like her personality, she must have been a very kind and warm person, passionate for life and friendship. Above all, I admire her capacity to keep making her life as interesting as she could, mostly out of her relationships with her friends, the good company of the title. Even over 60, she was still trying to make sense out of life, through reading, conversation with intelligent people, travelling. I like her keen observations about people and places and events, and I find her rending of her friendships extremely interesting and realistic - the way she conveys all the ambiguity and complexities of long term friendships is especially to the point when she describes her relationships with Julia Strachey or Gerald Brenan, who emerge from her depictions as real and lively people (not so much Janetta Woolley, who seems kind of lame).