Human Voices - Softcover

Fitzgerald, Penelope

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0006542549 ISBN 13: 9780006542544

Publisher: Albert Britnell Book Shop, 1997

Synopsis

Paperback. Pub Date :2010-05-06 Pages: 208 Language: English Publisher: HarperCollins UK A funny. touching. authentic story of life at Broadcasting House during the Blitz.The human voices of Penelope Fitzgerald's novel are those of the BBC in the first years of the World War II. the time when the Concert Hall was turned into a dormitory for both sexes. the whole building became a target for enemy bombers. and in the BBC - as elsewhere - some had to fail and some had to die . It does not pretend to be an accurate history of Broadcasting House in those years. but 'one is left with the sensation'. as William Boyd said. reviewing it in the 'London Magazine'. 'that this is what it was really like '

About this title

Review

In 1940, as World War II heats up, the BBC is doing its best to fulfill its singular mission: saving Britain from despondency and panic without resorting to lies. "Broadcasting House was in fact dedicated to the strangest project of the war, or of any war, that is, telling the truth." Surrounded by sandbags that are literally going to seed, this London landmark has come to resemble an ocean liner both inside and out. "With the best engineers in the world," Penelope Fitzgerald observes, "and a crew varying between the intensely respectable and the barely sane, it looked ready to scorn any disaster of less than Titanic scale." Though there are no icebergs in Human Voices, Fitzgerald's perfectly pitched 1980 novel, danger does loom on several decks.

For a start, the Department of Recorded Programmes (DRP) is in for a shakeup. Sam Brooks, its director (RPD), has long ruffled the Controllers' feathers owing to his need for several nubile assistants--no wonder his unit is sometimes labeled the Seraglio. This time, however, his penchant for young women isn't the issue. Instead, it's the fact that RPD takes his calling too seriously. For instance, in response to a directive that England's heritage not be lost, he and a crack team once spent two weeks recording a creaky church door in Heather Lickington. At this point, only Jeff Haggard, the Director of Programme Planning (DPP), can save Sam; but having done that for the past 10 years, DPP is suffering from severe BBC battle fatigue.

As Penelope Fitzgerald follows this pair--and several other employees--her novel melds tragedy, surrealism, and satire into one endlessly surprising whole. As ever, she captures the momentous in the smallest moment--the joys of an orange in wartime, the pleasures of piano tuning, and the painful twists of love. When the newest member of the Seraglio makes the mistake (or is it?) of falling for RPD, she does so

absolutely, and hers must have been the last generation to fall in love without hope in such an unproductive way. After the war the species no longer found it biologically useful, and indeed it was not useful to Annie. Love without hope grows in its own atmosphere, and should encourage the imagination, but Annie's grew narrower.

As is evident in this acute passage, and in virtually every other in Human Voices, Fitzgerald can pivot from sorrow to humor by way of pessimism and desire and then back again. If you so much as blink you'll miss one of the book's key turns or unexpected pleasures. No matter. Penelope Fitzgerald's human comedy always rewards rereading. --Kerry Fried

From the Back Cover

A tribute to the unsung and quintessentially English heroism of imperfect people. New Criterion

When British listeners tuned in to the BBC's Nine O'Clock News in the middle of 1940, they had no idea what human dramas and follies were unfolding behind the scenes. Targeted by enemy bombers, the BBC had turned its concert hall into a dormitory for both sexes, and personal chaos rivaled the political. Amidst the bombs and broadcasts two program directors fight for power while their younger female assistants fall prey to affairs, abandonment, and unrequited love. Reading this intimate glimpse behind the scenes of the BBC in its heyday, one is left with the sensation, William Boyd wrote in London Magazine, that this is what it was really like.

Human Voices is funny and touching and authentic, but it is more. It is affirmative in the best and most important sense. Sunday Times

Perfectly describes the moment when the British stiff upper lip begins to tremble in the face of overwhelming historical and emotional events. Publishers Weekly

PENELOPE FITZGERALD (1916 2000) was one of the most elegant and distinctive voices in British fiction. She won the National Book Critics Circle Award in fiction for The Blue Flower, the Booker Prize for Offshore, and three of her novels The Bookshop, The Gate of Angels, and The Beginning of Spring were short-listed for the Booker Prize."

About this edition

• Publisher: Albert Britnell Book Shop
• Publication date: 1997
• ISBN 10: 0006542549
• ISBN 13: 9780006542544
• Binding: Paperback