Good Night, Beloved Comrade : The Letters of Denton Welch to Eric Oliver

Daniel J. Murtaugh

ISBN 10: 0299310108 / ISBN 13: 9780299310103

Published by University Of Wisconsin Press Jul 2002, 2002

About this Item

Neuware - Denton Welch (1915 48) died at the age of thirty-three after a brief but brilliant career as a writer and painter. The revealing, poignant, impressionistic voice that buoys his novels was much praised by critics and literati in England and has since inspired creative artists from William S. Burroughs to John Waters. His achievements were all the more remarkable because he suffered from debilitating spinal and pelvic injuries incurred in a bicycle accident at age eighteen.Though German bombs were ravaging Britain, Welch wrote in his published work about the idyllic landscapes and local people he observed in Kent. There, in 1943, he met and fell in love with Eric Oliver, a handsome, intelligent, but rather insecure "landboy" an agricultural worker with the wartime Land Army. Oliver would become a companion, comrade, lover, and caretaker during the last six years of Welch s life. All fifty-one letters that Welch wrote to Oliver are collected and annotated here for the first time. They offer a historical record of life amidst the hardship, deprivation, and fear of World War II and are a timeless testament of one young man s tender and intimate emotions, his immense courage in adversity, and his continual struggle for love and creative existence.

Seller Inventory # 9780299310103

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Good Night, Beloved Comrade : The Letters of Denton Welch to Eric Oliver
• Publisher: University Of Wisconsin Press Jul 2002
• Publication Date: 2002
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0299310108
• ISBN 13: 9780299310103
• Binding: Buch
• Condition: Neu
• Dimensions: 218W x 147H x 20D millimeters 218 millimeters width by 147 millimeters height by 20 millimeters depth
• Weight: 369 grams

About this title

Synopsis

Denton Welch (1915–48) died at the age of thirty-three after a brief but brilliant career as a writer and painter. The revealing, poignant, impressionistic voice that buoys his novels was much praised by critics and literati in England and has since inspired creative artists from William S. Burroughs to John Waters. His achievements were all the more remarkable because he suffered from debilitating spinal and pelvic injuries incurred in a bicycle accident at age eighteen.

Though German bombs were ravaging Britain, Welch wrote in his published work about the idyllic landscapes and local people he observed in Kent. There, in 1943, he met and fell in love with Eric Oliver, a handsome, intelligent, but rather insecure "landboy"―an agricultural worker with the wartime Land Army. Oliver would become a companion, comrade, lover, and caretaker during the last six years of Welch's life. All fifty-one letters that Welch wrote to Oliver are collected and annotated here for the first time. They offer a historical record of life amidst the hardship, deprivation, and fear of World War II, and also are a timeless testament of one young man's tender and intimate emotions, his immense courage in adversity, and his continual struggle for love and creative existence.

About the Author

Daniel J. Murtaugh teaches literature and history at Park University and at Johnson County Community College. He lives in Kansas City, Missouri.