The Loved One (14 page)
Authors: Evelyn Waugh
To Katherine Asquith
[March 1948]
Dear Katherine,
I am delighted and astounded that you like
The Loved One
. I was sure it was much the most offensive work I had done. It shows I simply do not understand about decency at all.
… I have read all 3 Fossett books and was
greatly shocked
by them. So much so that I wrote a letter of reproof to Christopher
9
which was not well received.
Love from
Evelyn
My “Homage to Ronnie” is postponed until May.
To A. D. Peters
[20 August 1948]
[Postcard]
Not keen on dramatization of
Loved One
but open to persuasion. Name of dramatist unimportant but he must submit detailed scenario. Then if I approve he can go ahead but I retain right of censorship over all dialogue.
E
Sir L. Olivier thinks it will make a film.
10
He must be insane.
To A. D. Peters
[Received 18 January 1949]
[Postcard]
… Don’t want to be punished at all by communist countries. If not too late stop all negotiations with them. They might use
Loved One
as anti-American propaganda.
E.W.
To A. D. Peters
[Received 9 August 1949]
[Postcard]
You grow more like Perry Mason daily. I know no higher praise.
11
1. Dennis is many things—poet, screenwriter, undertaker, lover, aspiring nonsectarian pastor—but does not seem to be particularly good at any of them. Is there one thing he is good at? What drives Dennis?
2. The social group that Dennis and Sir Francis share in Los Angeles is insular and deeply defined by the care they take to preserve their Englishness. Is this a trait particular to the British, or something common in expatriate communities?
3. While he is trying to persuade Dennis away from the funeral business, Sir Ambrose says to him that it’s below his dignity as an Englishman living in America: “It’s only the finest type of Englishman you meet out here…. We can’t all be at the top of the tree but we are all men of responsibility. You never find an Englishman among the underdogs—except in England, of course” (
here
). Do you think this is true? How, and why, do you think Dennis’s perspective on his employment differs from Sir Ambrose’s?
4.
In Old French, Aimée means “beloved” or “the loved one.” Is the title a specific reference to Aimée, or are “loved ones” a recurring theme?
5. Dennis is fascinated by Whispering Glades even before he meets Aimée—why do you think that is? Is Dennis drawn to the funeral business, or is he merely comfortable with death?
6. Both Aimée and Mr. Joyboy consider Dennis’s workplace, Happier Hunting Ground, to be crude and tasteless. Why do they believe their work is more meaningful? Are they right?
7. The great poets are a recurring theme in Dennis’s life—he is brought to California to “write the life of Shelley for the films,” and as he woos Aimée he cribs their poetry instead of using his own, even going so far as to borrow some of Shakespeare’s most famous sonnets. The only poetry of Dennis’s that we see is made up in jest. Do you think Dennis has any poetic talent? Or is he, like Sir Francis describes himself, “the most defatigable of hacks”?
8. Aimée is constantly asking for advice from the newspaper columnist Guru Brahmin. Though this plot is very much in line with Waugh’s ongoing satirization of the newspaper business, it also shines a light on Aimée’s internal dialogue.
What do we learn about her through her letters to the Guru?
9. In conversation with his boss, Mr. Schultz, Dennis claims that he has become the protagonist of “a Jamesian problem,” and that all of Henry James’s stories are about the same thing, “American innocence and European experience.” Do you think that is what Aimée and Dennis’s relationship is about? Or is there more to it than that?
10. Joyboy and Dennis care about Aimée in very different ways. Do you think either of them truly loved her? Were you surprised at how the love triangle resolved itself?
11. Despite his admiration for Los Angeles, Dennis ultimately decides to leave (and take advantage of those willing to pay his way back to England). Were you surprised by this? What do you think Dennis will do next?
12. When
The Loved One
was made into a movie in 1965, its tagline was “The motion picture with something to offend everyone!” Can the same be said of the book?
Curious to find out more about Evelyn Waugh? Here are some titles worth investigating.
A Little Learning: An Autobiography,
Evelyn Waugh
When the Going Was Good,
Evelyn Waugh
Waugh Abroad: The Collected Travel Writing,
Evelyn Waugh
The Letters of Evelyn Waugh,
edited by Mark Amory
The Diaries of Evelyn Waugh,
edited by Michael Davie
The Letters of Nancy Mitford and Evelyn Waugh,
edited by Charlotte Mosley
The Letters of Evelyn Waugh and Diana Cooper,
edited by Artemis Cooper
Evelyn Waugh: The Early Years, 1903–1939,
Martin Stannard
Evelyn Waugh: The Later Years, 1939–1966,
Martin Stannard
Evelyn Waugh: A Biography,
Selina Hastings
Evelyn Waugh: A Biography,
Christopher Sykes
The Life of Evelyn Waugh: A Critical Biography,
Douglas Patey
Will This Do? An Autobiography,
Auberon Waugh
Fathers and Sons: The Autobiography of a Family,
Alexander Waugh
Evelyn Waugh (1903–1966) was born in Hampstead, England, into a family of publishers and writers. He was educated at Lancing and Hertford College, Oxford, where he majored in journalism and modern history.
Waugh’s first book,
Rossetti: His Life and Works,
was published in 1928. Soon afterward his first novel,
Decline and Fall,
appeared and his career was sensationally launched. “In fifteen novels of cunning construction and lapidary eloquence,”
Time
summarized later, “Evelyn Waugh developed a wickedly hilarious yet fundamentally religious assault on a century that, in his opinion, had ripped up the nourishing taproot of tradition and let wither all the dear things of the world.” Apart from his novels, Waugh also wrote several acclaimed travel books, two additional biographies, and an autobiography,
A Little Learning.
His short fiction is collected in
The Complete Stories.
Novels
Decline and Fall
Vile Bodies
Black Mischief
A Handful of Dust
Scoop
Put Out More Flags
Brideshead Revisited
The Loved One
Helena
Men at Arms
Officers and Gentlemen
The Ordeal of Gilbert Pinfold
Unconditional Surrender
(also published as
The End of the Battle)
Sword of Honor
(omnibus)
Mr. Loveday’s Little Outing, and Other Sad Stories
Tactical Exercise
Basil Seal Rides Again
Charles Ryder’s Schooldays
The Complete Stories
Rossetti
Edmund Campion
Msgr. Ronald Knox
A Little Learning
The Diaries of Evelyn Waugh
The Letters of Evelyn Waugh
A Bachelor Abroad
They Were Still Dancing
Ninety-Two Days
Waugh in Abyssinia
Mexico: An Object Lesson
When the Going Was Good
A Tourist in Africa
A Little Order
The Essays, Articles and Reviews of Evelyn Waugh
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1
On January 27 Waugh sailed for New York, and on February 6 he reached Los Angeles. MGM was paying his expenses in order to discuss making a film of
Brideshead Revisited.
2
Sir Charles Mendl (1871–1958). Press attaché at the British Embassy in Paris 1926–40. Married to Elsie de Wolfe, 1926–50.
3
Published in 1939.
4
Waugh eventually turned down an offer of £125,000 for the film rights of
Brideshead Revisited
.
5
Louis B. Mayer (1885–1957). Vice President and general manager of MGM.
6
Enid Bagnold (1889–1981). Writer. She married Sir Roderick Jones in 1920, lived near Rottingdean in Sussex, and wrote
National Velvet
in 1935.
7
The intense and prolonged cold of the winter of 1947 caused power cuts.
8
Cigars at the hairdresser in Curzon Street.
9
Christopher Hollis wrote
Death of a Gentleman,
1943,
Fossett’s Memory,
1944, and
Letters to a Sister,
1947.
10
Laurence Olivier (1907–1989). Actor. Knighted 1947. Life Peer 1970.
The Loved One
was eventually made into a film in 1965 by Tony Richardson in Hollywood with John Gielgud, Liberace, and Rod Steiger̴1—“an elaborate travesty.”
11
Perhaps because Peters had suggested offering the film rights of
Scoop
for £5,000; more likely because he was struggling to obtain francs for Waugh in Paris.
Questions and topics for discussion
The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
Copyright © 1948 by Evelyn Waugh
Copyright renewed © 1976 by Auberon Waugh
Reading group guide copyright © 2012 by the Estate of Evelyn Waugh and Little, Brown and Company
Author photograph © Hulton-Deutsch Collection / CORBIS
Cover design by Keith Hayes. Cover illustration by Jon Contino
Cover copyright © 2012 by Hachette Book Group, Inc.
All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher constitute unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the publisher at [email protected]. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.
Little, Brown and Company
Hachette Book Group
237 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10017
First e-book edition: December 2012
The text of this edition follows, with minor emendations, an edition of 1965, which was the last to be overseen by the author.
ISBN 978-0-316-21648-7
