Anna Reid
A Very Azeri Upbringing
Days in the Caucasus
By Banine (Translated by Anne Thompson-Ahmadova)
Pushkin Press 273pp £16.99 order from our bookshop
‘We all know families that are poor but “respectable”. Mine, in contrast, was extremely rich but not “respectable” at all.’ Born in 1905 in the ancient desert city of Baku, Banine (full name Umm-el-Banine Assadullayeva) was the fourth daughter of an Azeri oil baron, and thus a member of an exotic, semi-Russified oligarch class that flourished briefly between the discovery of oil on the Caspian in the 1870s and the Russian Revolution. Emigrating in the early 1920s, she lived most of her life in Paris, where she became a well-known figure on the mid-century literary scene. Dashingly translated from the original French by Anne Thompson-Ahmadova, this is the first publication in English of her witty and wonderful childhood memoir.
Sign Up to our newsletter
Receive free articles, highlights from the archive, news, details of prizes, and much more.@Lit_Review
Follow Literary Review on Twitter
'Only in Britain, perhaps, could spy chiefs – conventionally viewed as masters of subterfuge – be so highly regarded as ethical guides.'
https://literaryreview.co.uk/the-spy-who-taught-me
In this month's Bookends, @AdamCSDouglas looks at the curious life of Henry Labouchere: a friend of Bram Stoker, 'loose cannon', and architect of the law that outlawed homosexual activity in Britain.
https://literaryreview.co.uk/a-gross-indecency
'We have all twenty-nine of her Barsetshire novels, and whenever a certain longing reaches critical mass we read all twenty-nine again, straight through.'
Patricia T O'Conner on her love for Angela Thirkell. (£)
https://literaryreview.co.uk/good-gad