From the Bookshelf of Should have read classics…

Brideshead Revisited

Evelyn Waugh

Start date: April 1, 2013

Finish date: April 30, 2013

Discussion: Group Book Discussions

Why we're reading this: This is the group read for April.
[close] This is the group read for April.

Find A Copy At

Libraries

Group Discussions About This Book

Showing 2 of 89 topics — 2,128 comments total

Group Book Discussions

Canterbury Tales
By Lisa , the usurper · 32 posts · 65 views

last updated Jul 09, 2017 11:45PM

Alice in Wonderland
By Lisa , the usurper · 7 posts · 21 views

last updated May 04, 2017 10:28PM

showing 1 of 1 topics view all »

What Members Thought

Jun 01, 2017 Anne (Booklady) Molinarolo rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: classics, literary-fiction, read-around-world, summer-2017

"My theme is memory, that winged host that soared about me one gray morning of war-time.

But for Charles Ryder, the coming back to Brideshead evokes much more than memories. Twenty some odd years ago at Oxford, he met Sebastian Flyte and for Charles Ryder
that summer term with Sebastian, it seemed as though I was being given a brief spell of what I had never known, a happy childhood, and though its toys were silk shirts and liqueurs and cigars and its naughtiness high in the catalogue of grave s "My theme is memory, that winged host that soared about me one gray morning of war-time.

But for Charles Ryder, the coming back to Brideshead evokes much more than memories. Twenty some odd years ago at Oxford, he met Sebastian Flyte and for Charles Ryder
that summer term with Sebastian, it seemed as though I was being given a brief spell of what I had never known, a happy childhood, and though its toys were silk shirts and liqueurs and cigars and its naughtiness high in the catalogue of grave sins, there was something of nursery freshness about us that fell little short of the joy of innocence."

There it is. CATHOLIC GUILT in Capital letters. Sebastian lost his joy, his own identity because of Lady Marchmain's deeply held Catholicism. The more she manipulated him, the more poor Sebastian drank. "It's where my family lives," Sebastian tells Charles on the day Ryder first visited Brideshead.

Prior to his second visit to Brideshead and just before before we see Julia Flyte's impressions upon Charles, his old Oxford buddy, Anthony says to him regarding his latest Art Exhibit, " I found, my dear, a very naughty and very successful practical joke. It reminded me of dear Sebastian when he liked so much to dress up in false whiskers. It was charm again, my dear, simple, creamy English charm, playing tigers.” “You’re quite right,” I said. “My dear, of course I’m right. I was right years ago—more years, I am happy to say, than either of us shows—when I warned you. I took you out to dinner to warn you of charm. I warned you expressly and in great detail of the Flyte family. Charm is the great English blight. It does not exist outside these damp islands. It spots and kills anything it touches. It kills love; it kills art; I greatly fear, my dear Charles, it has killed you.”

But Charles Ryder tells us, Looking back, now, after twenty years, there is little I would have left undone or done otherwise."

And after reading Brideshead Revisited, I agree Charles Ryder couldn't have done anything but what he did. ...more

3 likes · Like · see review

Jan 23, 2011 Shawn rated it really liked it

There are many themes in this book but, to me, the greatest is the evil of religion and how its avarice nature, unchecked, will worm into lives and destroy all joy and happiness without compunction. This message, wrapped in Waugh’s sweet, elegant prose conducts the reader through this poignant, morose tale, that is, even still, utterly delightful.

Like · see review

Oct 11, 2011 Roberta rated it really liked it

Shelves: uk, to-reread, 2009

Bellissima saga di una famiglia aristocratica vista attraverso gli occhi di un amico che rivisita con nostalgia i luoghi mentali della sua gioventù.

Like · see review

Nov 22, 2010 Dyuti Mishra marked it as to-read

Feb 05, 2011 Ellen marked it as wishlist

Shelves: 20thc-pd, classic

Feb 25, 2011 Misha rated it it was amazing

Shelves: british, made-into-a-movie-or-a-show, italy, favourites, classics, literary-fiction, 20th-century, 1001-books, purchased-2018, favourites-2012