Jeremy Lewis
England, My England
Their Promised Land: My Grandparents in Love and War
By Ian Buruma
Atlantic Books 305pp £18.99
As a child in the late 1950s and early 1960s, Ian Buruma came over with his family from his home in Holland to visit his English grandparents. Bernard and Winifred – known to each other as ‘Bun’ and ‘Win’ – lived in St Mary Woodlands House, a large vicarage in Berkshire. The Burumas would be greeted by ‘Grandpop’, a sturdy, kindly figure in a green tweed jacket, smoking a pipe; there was a cook and a charlady and a homely smell of old dog. In the summer, croquet was played on the lawn and village fetes were held, with cucumber sandwiches and home-made cakes served up to local grandees. One of the many stamp-sized photographs in the book shows Win holding a paper-hatted Buruma up to a lighted Christmas tree.
It was all quintessentially English, and proudly so; and yet there were small markers that differentiated Bun and Win from their more conventional neighbours. They were both passionate about music, Wagner in particular. Their surname was Schlesinger, and a retired colonel in the village was occasionally heard to mutter, ‘Don’t
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
Twitter Feed
London's East End was long synonymous with poverty and sweatshops, while its West End was associated with glamour and high society. But when it came to the fashion industry, were the differences really so profound?
Sharman Kadish - Winkle-pickers & Bum Freezers
Sharman Kadish: Winkle-pickers & Bum Freezers - Fashion City: How Jewish Londoners Shaped Global Style; Fashion City: ...
literaryreview.co.uk
In 1982, Donald Rumsfeld presented Saddam Hussein with a pair of golden spurs. Two decades later he was dropping bunker-busting bombs on his palaces.
Where did the US-Iraqi relationship go wrong?
Rory Mccarthy - The Case of the Vanishing Missiles
Rory Mccarthy: The Case of the Vanishing Missiles - The Achilles Trap: Saddam Hussein, the United States and the ...
literaryreview.co.uk
Barbara Comyns was a dog breeder, a house painter, a piano restorer, a landlady... And a novelist.
@nclarke14 on the lengths 20th-century women writers had to go to make ends meet:
Norma Clarke - Her Family & Other Animals
Norma Clarke: Her Family & Other Animals - Barbara Comyns: A Savage Innocence by Avril Horner
literaryreview.co.uk