Rent Brideshead Revisited

Synopsis

This is Evelyn Waugh’s outsider’s account of a troubled aristocratic family. Charles Ryder, the narrator, is a dull and rather pompous undergraduate at Oxford when he meets Sebastian Flyte, a wealthy and sybaritic classmate. The two become improbable friends, and Sebastian brings Charles to Brideshead, his family estate, and introduces him into the circle of rich aristocratic layabouts who inhabit the place. Charles falls in love with Sebastian’s sister, Julia, but religious objections (Charles is divorced, and the Flytes are Catholics) stand in the way of their marriage. Although strongly satirical in parts, and written with the savage wit for which Waugh was renowned, BRIDESHEAD REVISITED is a work of rare sensitivity and depth. The novel was made into a landmark 11-hour mini-series by the BBC in 1991, starring Jeremy Irons as Charles, Laurence Olivier as Lord Marchmain (for which he won an Emmy), Claire Bloom as Lady Marchmain, and John Gielgud as Charles’s father, Edward.

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