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JOHN BETJEMAN

THE BIOGRAPHY

An exemplary biography evoking, in classic form, lives and times just gone.

The reigning authority on all things Betjemaniac squeezes his assiduous three-volume biography about the late poet laureate into one really big paperback.

The sometimes naughty, sometimes haughty Sir John Betjeman (1906–84) was the very archetype of a Bright Young Thing, one of those madcap eccentrics larking about London all those years ago between the wars. World War II service found him in Dublin, Bath and Blenheim Palace. He gained postwar recognition at home and abroad as a critic of architecture, books and film, as well as a poet, building his popularity with appearances on the Beeb’s radio and telly. He sought to save heaps of Victorian landmarks from destruction and railed against ugly lampposts. But Jolly Sir John, it appears, was not much of a father. Married to horse-loving Penelope, he maintained a lengthy relationship, discretely described by Hillier (Young Betjeman, 2004, etc.), with a lady-in-waiting to Princess Margaret. W.H. Auden, Evelyn Waugh, Osbert Lancaster and Dame Edna Everage numbered among his friends, but perhaps the poet’s dearest companion was Archie, the teddy bear who was nestled in his arms on the morning he died. Poet laureate for 12 years, Betjeman was buried in Westminster Abbey. Hillier provides a few samples of his poesy, verse with little vice that, like Ogden Nash’s or W.S. Gilbert’s Bab Ballads, is best read aloud. The rhymes, in strict meter, contain japes, jokes, pranks, puns, sense and nonsense—as well as momentary, startling tugs at the heart. This Betjeman encyclopedia, though, isn’t about the poetry; it’s about the poet. Ornamented with such lingo as “clunch” and “festinant,” his life story is as British as a tea room in old Drayneflete, and bloody well done too.

An exemplary biography evoking, in classic form, lives and times just gone.

Pub Date: July 1, 2007

ISBN: 978-0-7195-6443-7

Page Count: 608

Publisher: John Murray Press

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2007

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MRS. KENNEDY AND ME

AN INTIMATE MEMOIR

Of the many words written about Jacqueline Kennedy, these are among the best.

Evocative memoir of guarding First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy through the young and sparkling years of the Kennedy presidency and the dark days following the assassination.

Secret Service Special Agent Hill had not looked forward to guarding Mrs. Kennedy. The action was with the president. But duty trumped preference, and he first met a young and pregnant soon-to-be First Lady in November 1960. For the next four years Hill would seldom leave her side. Theirs would be an odd relationship of always-proper formality combined with deep intimacy crafted through close proximity and mutual trust and respect. Hill was soon captivated, as was the rest of the world, by Mrs. Kennedy’s beauty and grace, but he saw beyond such glamour a woman of fierce intelligence and determination—to raise her children as normally as possible, to serve the president and country, to preserve for herself a playful love of life. Hill became a part of the privileged and vigorous life that went with being a Kennedy, and in which Jacqueline held her own. He traveled the world with her, marveling at the adulation she received, but he also shared the quiet, offstage times with her: sneaking a cigarette in the back of a limousine, becoming her unwilling and inept tennis partner. When the bullet ripped into the president’s brain with Hill not five feet away, he remained with her, through the public and private mourning, “when the laughter and hope had been washed away.” Soon after, both would go on with their lives, but Hill would never stop loving Mrs. Kennedy and never stop feeling he could have done more to save the president. With clear and honest prose free of salaciousness and gossip, Hill (ably assisted by McCubbin) evokes not only a personality both beautiful and brilliant, poised and playful, but also a time when the White House was filled with youth and promise.

Of the many words written about Jacqueline Kennedy, these are among the best.

Pub Date: April 3, 2012

ISBN: 978-1-4516-4844-7

Page Count: 320

Publisher: Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster

Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2012

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2012

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REASONS TO STAY ALIVE

A vibrant, encouraging depiction of a sinister disorder.

A British novelist turns to autobiography to report the manifold symptoms and management of his debilitating disease, depression.

Clever author Haig (The Humans, 2013, etc.) writes brief, episodic vignettes, not of a tranquil life but of an existence of unbearable, unsustainable melancholy. Throughout his story, presented in bits frequently less than a page long (e.g., “Things you think during your 1,000th panic attack”), the author considers phases he describes in turn as Falling, Landing, Rising, Living, and, finally, simply Being with spells of depression. Haig lists markers of his unseen disease, including adolescent angst, pain, continual dread, inability to speak, hypochondria, and insomnia. He describes his frequent panic attacks and near-constant anhedonia, the inability to experience pleasure. Haig also assesses the efficacy of neuroscience, yoga, St. John’s wort, exercise, pharmaceuticals, silence, talking, walking, running, staying put, and working up the courage to do even the most seemingly mundane of tasks, like visiting the village store. Best for the author were reading, writing, and the frequent dispensing of kindnesses and love. He acknowledges particularly his debt to his then-girlfriend, now-wife. After nearly 15 years, Haig is doing better. He appreciates being alive and savors the miracle of existence. His writing is infectious though sometimes facile—and grammarians may be upset with the writer’s occasional confusion of the nominative and objective cases of personal pronouns. Less tidy and more eclectic than William Styron’s equally brief, iconic Darkness Visible, Haig’s book provides unobjectionable advice that will offer some help and succor to those who experience depression and other related illnesses. For families and friends of the afflicted, Haig’s book, like Styron’s, will provide understanding and support.

A vibrant, encouraging depiction of a sinister disorder.

Pub Date: Feb. 23, 2016

ISBN: 978-0-14-312872-4

Page Count: 272

Publisher: Penguin

Review Posted Online: Nov. 3, 2015

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2015

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