Don't worry, Douglas, I've seen the Aldritt book - and its reviews!
Bunting biography must be a gift to review, by the way - all you have to
do is trot through the gaudier parts of BB's life as if you'd known it all
anyway, and tag a few words on at the end about the book itself! Most of
the reviews make the obvious "journeyman" comment about Aldritt's writing,
but so far only William Scammell (that crusading defender of britpo) in
?the Obverver was it? goes on to point out how much Aldritt "borrows" from
others - with scant acknowledgement to the people who actually did the
legwork. 'Twas ever thus.
My problem with Aldritt is that he doesn't distinguish between the real,
nailable facts of BB's life, and the myths which Bunting and others cast
around the facts, and the yarns somebody told him over a drink - it all
goes in as gospel. In this he's obviously making a good racy filmscript,
and storytelling in a tradition BB would've loved - but something in my
dull, prosaic nature says Hey! Waitaminute!
Makin's book's still in print, by the way, you can buy it from amazon.com
for instance, any time you've fifty quid to spare. It'll take you much
further into the real BB than any of the rest.
If you're still up for more Buntingiana, there's a little nest of pieces
in Chicago Review v44 nos 3/4 1998 - articles by Tom Pickard (selections
from his biography of BB); Colin Simms (selections from taped
conversations with BB); Bill Griffiths (on the Bunting material in the
Mottram Archive - a very useful summary first presented as a paper for the
Bunting Centre last year) and John Seed (on Bunting's "Englishness" -
follow-up to his piece in "Sharp Study and Long Toil").
Enough Bunting industry already. I want the next post on BB to have the
cast for the Andrew Lloyd Webber Ice Musical of his life, "Slaughtering
The Turdbakers"...
RC
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