Yesterday, Dame Beryl Bainbridge died at the age of 75. I am looking at a photograph of her that must have been taken several years ago, but it is an ageless face. She is resting the side of her face against a hand, which holds a cigarette. (For her, smoking was part of the writing process.) Her eyes are large and deeply set, looking at something out of shot, observing. She has enviable bone structure. There is a slight lift at the corner of her mouth, almost a smile but not quite. Like her writing, I suspect that humour disguises a seriousness.
In a documentary that she made for the BBC4, she said, “Everybody should write down, as best they can, before they die, what they think they were like. Then their children won’t get an entirely different idea of who they were.” Since she also claimed to base characters on herself, reading one of her books seems a good place to start looking for Dame Beryl.
This is the work that she left us:
A Weekend with Claud (revised as ‘A Weekend with Claude; 1981) Hutchinson, 1967
Another Part of the Wood Hutchinson, 1968
Harriet Said Duckworth, 1972
Sweet William Duckworth, 1973
The Dressmaker Duckworth, 1973
The Bottle Factory Outing Duckworth, 1974
A Quiet Life Duckworth, 1976
Injury Time Duckworth, 1977
Young Adolf Duckworth, 1978
Winter Garden Duckworth, 1980
English Journey Duckworth, 1984
Watson’s Apology Duckworth, 1984
Forever England Duckworth, 1985
Mum and Mr Armitage Duckworth, 1985
Filthy Lucre, or The Tragedy of Andrew Ledwhistle and Richard Soleway Duckworth, 1986
An Awfully Big Adventure Duckworth, 1989
The Birthday Boys Duckworth, 1991
Something Happened Yesterday Duckworth, 1993
Collected Stories Duckworth, 1994
Every Man For Himself Duckworth, 1996
Master Georgie Duckworth, 1998
According to Queeney Little, Brown, 2001
Front Row: Evenings at the Theatre Continuum International, 2005
The Girl in the Polka Dot Dress Little, Brown, 2008
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