Memorial - (FSG Classics) by Christopher Isherwood (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

Set in the aftermath of World War I, Christopher Isherwood's The Memorial is the witty, almost forensic portrayal of the dissolution of a tradition-bound English family. On the cusp of adulthood, the Cambridge student Eric Vernon finds himself torn between his desire to emulate his heroic father, who led a life of quiet sacrifice before dying in the war, and his envy of his father's roguish friend who survived the war and afterward threw himself into gay life.

Published in 1932, when Isherwood was twenty-eight years old, The Memorial is the novel in which a dazzlingly talented young writer found his literary voice, the book in which Isherwood became Isherwood.

Review Quotes

"The best prose writer in English." --Gore Vidal, The New York Review of Books

"Dazzling . . . Pre-eminent for its wit, humour, charm of style and narrative skill." --John Lehmann, The Guardian

About the Author

Christopher Isherwood (1904-1986) was born in Manchester, England, and lived in Berlin from 1929 to 1933 and immigrated to the United States in 1939. A major figure in twentieth-century fiction and the gay rights movement, he wrote more than twenty books. FSG Classics presents some of his finest work, including the novels Prater Violet, A Single Man, and A Meeting by the River; the semi-autobiographical Lions and Shadows; and the memoir Christopher and His Kind.