Brideshead revisited : the sacred and profane memories of Captain Charles Ryder

Evelyn Waugh's classic novel of duty and desire set against the backdrop of the faded glory of the English aristocracy in the run-up to the Second World War. "Expresses at once the profundity of change and the indomitable endurance of the human spirit." - The TimesThe most nostalgic and reflective of Evelyn Waugh's novels, Brideshead Revisited looks back to the golden age before the Second World War. It tells the story of Charles Ryder's infatuation with the Marchmains and the rapidly disappearing world of privilege they inhabit. Enchanted first by Sebastian Flyte at Oxford, then by his doomed Catholic family, in particular his remote sister, Julia, Charles comes finally to recognise his spiritual and social distance from them. "A genuine literary masterpiece... Brideshead Revisited is actually a wildly entertaining, swooningly funny-sad story about an impressionable young man, Charles Ryder, who goes to Oxford in the 1930s and falls in love with a family: the wealthy, eccentric, aristocratic Flytes, owners of a grand old country house called Brideshead... Told in flashbacks from the dark days of World War II, the novel is aglimmer with the guttering candle glow of an elegant age that was already passing away." — Lev Grossman, TIMEEvelyn Waugh In 1928 he published his first novel, Decline and Fall, which was soon followed by Vile Bodies (1930), Black Mischief (1932), A Handful of Dust (1934) and Scoop (1938). During these years he also travelled extensively and converted to Catholicism. In 1939 Waugh was commissioned in the Royal Marines and later transferred to the Royal Horse Guards, experiences which informed his Sword of Honour trilogy (1952-61). His most famous novel, Brideshead Revisited (1945), was written while on leave from the army. Set In 1920's England, The Story Examines The Wealthy Flyte Family Through The Eyes Of Sebastian Flyte's Less Wealthy School Friend Charles Ryder, Who Is Eventually Tempted Into An Extramarital Affair With Sebastian's Sister, Lady Julia. The Novel Is A Story Of Faith And Disillusionment In A Glamorous Upper-class World. Prologoue: Brideshead Revisited -- Book One: Et In Arcadia Ego. -- I Meet Sebastian Flyle-and Anthony Blanch E-i Visit Brideshead For The First Time -- My Cousin Jasper's Grand Remonstrance-a Warning Against Charm-sunday Morning In Oxford -- My Father At Home-lady Julia Flyte -- Sebastian At Home-lord Marchmain Abroad -- Autumn In Oxford-dinner With Rex Mottram And Supper With Boy Mulcaster-mr. Samgress-lady Marchmain At Home-sebastian Contra Mundum -- Book Two: Brideshead Deserted. -- Samgrass Revealed-i Take Leave Of Brideshead-rex Revealed -- Julia And Rex -- Mulcaster And I In Defense Of Our Country-sebastian Abroad-i Take Leave Of Marchmain House -- Book Three: A Twitch Upon The Thread. -- Orphans Of The Storm -- Private View-rex Mottram At Home -- The Fountain -- Sebastian Contra Mundum -- Lord Marchmain At Home-death In The Chinese Drawing Room-the Purpose Revealed -- Epilogue: Brideshead Revisited. Evelyn Waugh. Selected by Modern Library as one of the 100 best novels of the century and called "Evelyn Waugh's finest achievement" by the New York Times , Brideshead Revisited is a stunning exploration of desire, duty, and memory. The wellsprings of desire and the impediments to love come brilliantly into focus in Evelyn Waugh's masterpiece — a novel that immerses us in the glittering and seductive world of English aristocracy in the waning days of the empire. Through the story of Charles Ryder's entanglement with the Flytes, a great Catholic family, Evelyn Waugh charts the passing of the privileged world he knew in his own youth and vividly recalls the sensuous pleasures denied him by wartime austerities. At once romantic, sensuous, comic, and somber, Brideshead Revisited transcends Waugh's early satiric explorations and reveals him to be an elegiac, lyrical novelist of the utmost feeling and lucidity. "A genuine literary masterpiece." — Time "Heartbreakingly beautiful...The twentieth century's finest English novel." — Los Angeles Times The most nostalgic and reflective of Evelyn Waugh's novels, *Brideshead Revisited* looks back to the golden age before the Second World War. It tells the story of Charles Ryder's infatuation with the Marchmains and the rapidly-disappearing world of privilege they inhabit. Enchanted first by Sebastian at Oxford, then by his doomed Catholic family, in particular his remote sister, Julia, Charles comes finally to recognize only his spiritual and social distance from them. Tells the story of the difficult loves of insular Englishman Charles Ryder, and his peculiarly intense relationship with the wealthy but dysfunctional family that inhabited Brideshead. While at Oxford, Charles Ryder meets boyish, flamboyant Sebastian Flyte, who introduces Charles to a charmed and glamorous way of life that continues until Sebastian's health deteriorates