H. E. Bates

The Fabulous Mrs. V. (eBook, ePUB)

• Format: ePub

Produktbeschreibung

First published in 1964, The Fabulous Mrs. V. is a late collection of twelve stories celebrating comedy and Bates's ability to paint amusing, idiosyncratic women.

'A Couple of Fools' follows two fashionable young women, ripe for a luxurious Sunday afternoon outing, who find that their flamboyant hats win them attention and favours at every step. They and their male admirers become too drunk for anything but a taxi home.

Another story similarly celebrates liquor, food, and sex. 'A Party for the Girls' is a comic celebration of life where a group of older women drink lavish quantities of alcohol at a luncheon and compete for the attention of the sole male guest.

'The Trespasser' is a comic piece involving a near-sighted and eccentric spinster 'who looked not at all unlike a round fresh radish,' and a young man who watches with some disgust as his aunt orchestrates the seduction of her future husband.

But it is not just the women who are given Bates's quirky treatment.

'The Cat Who Sang' observes an overworked teacher who hallucinates that his black cat Susie is able to sing Schubert's 'Trout' theme. In 'A Dream of Fair Women' a body building adolescent boy engages in vivid fantasies about women risque enough to be reprinted in Penthouse Magazine in 1965. Also included with this cast of quirky characters is a retired Reverend in bonus story 'The Electric Christ', who becomes enamoured with a statue of Christ with an electric halo and purchases it for his home.

The Times Literary Supplement found that the collection 'demonstrates that both his vigour and unique ability to evoke, visually, his settings and characters remain undiminished.'

Produktdetails

• Verlag: Bloomsbury UK
• Seitenzahl: 192
• Erscheinungstermin: 6. Oktober 2016
• Englisch
• ISBN-13: 9781448215263
• Artikelnr.: 45970611

Autorenporträt

H. E. Bates was born in 1905 in the shoe-making town of Rushden, Northamptonshire, and educated at Kettering Grammar School. After leaving school, he worked as a reporter and as a clerk in a leather warehouse. Many of his stories depict life in the rural Midlands, particularly his native Northamptonshire, where he spent many hours wandering the countryside.

His first novel, The Two Sisters (1926) was published by Jonathan Cape when he was just twenty. Many critically acclaimed novels and collections of short stories followed. During WWII he was commissioned into the RAF solely to write short stories, which were published under the pseudonym 'Flying Officer X'. His first financial success was Fair Stood the Wind for France (1944), followed by two novels about Burma, The Purple Plain (1947) and The Jacaranda Tree (1949) and one set in India, The Scarlet Sword (1950). Other well-known novels include Love for Lydia (1952) and The Feast of July (1954).

His most popular creation was the Larkin family which featured in five novels beginning with The Darling Buds of May in 1958. The later television adaptation was a huge success. Many other stories were adapted for the screen, the most renowned being The Purple Plain (1947) starring Gregory Peck, and The Triple Echo (1970) with Glenda Jackson and Oliver Reed.

H. E. Bates married in 1931, had four children and lived most of his life in a converted granary near Charing in Kent. He was awarded the CBE in 1973, shortly before his death in 1974.