A Handful of Dust.
by WAUGH, Evelyn
- Used
- first
- Condition
- See description
- Seller
-
LONDON, United Kingdom
Payment Methods Accepted
About This Item
Synopsis
British writer Evelyn Waugh’s A Handful of Dust tells the story of Tony Last, a disillusioned and soon-to-be-divorced country squire, who travels of the jungle of Brazil — only to find himself the prisoner of an unhinged settler who forces him to continuously read aloud the works of Charles Dickens. A Handful of Dust is often grouped with Waugh’s satirical novels prior to World War II; however, because of its serious undertones, it can also been seen as a transitional work to his more substantial postwar fiction. The novel has autobiographical elements, reflecting the author’s own failed marriage and his resulting South American journey in 1933-1934. But on a deeper note, A Handful of Dust illustrates the parallels the savage nature of London society with uncivilized barbarity of the jungle. Waugh first used Tony as the protagonist in his 1933 short story titled The Man Who Liked Dickens. The piece was published in the US in Hearst's International–Cosmopolitan and in Britain in Nash's Pall Mall Magazine. Tony’s story was then serialized — after much revision and expansion — under the title A Flat in London. When it came time to publish the story as a novel, Waugh selected the title A Handful of Dust, inspired by a line in T. S. Eliot's The Waste Land: "I will show you fear in a handful of dust." Upon publication, the critical reception of A Handful of Dust was less than impressive. Yet the novel was and has remained popular with the public and has never been out of print. A Handful of Dust is ranked 34th on Modern Library’s “100 Best” English-language novels of the 20th century. It is also listed as one of TIME’s “100 Best Novels” (since 1923).
Reviews
(Log in or Create an Account first!)
Details
- Bookseller
- Peter Ellis bookseller (GB)
- Bookseller's Inventory #
- WAUGHEVE014136
- Title
- A Handful of Dust.
- Author
- WAUGH, Evelyn
- Book Condition
- Used
- Publisher
- Chapman and Hall, London.
- Date Published
- 1934
Terms of Sale
Peter Ellis bookseller
30 day return guarantee, with full refund including shipping costs for up to 30 days after delivery if an item arrives misdescribed or damaged.
About the Seller
Peter Ellis bookseller
About Peter Ellis bookseller
Glossary
Some terminology that may be used in this description includes:
- Spine
- The outer portion of a book which covers the actual binding. The spine usually faces outward when a book is placed on a shelf....
- Tail
- The heel of the spine.
- Dustwrapper
- Also known as book jacket, dust cover, or dust wrapper, a dust jacket is a protective and decorative cover for a book that is...
- Octavo
- Another of the terms referring to page or book size, octavo refers to a standard printer's sheet folded four times, producing...
- Edges
- The collective of the top, fore and bottom edges of the text block of the book, being that part of the edges of the pages of a...
- First Edition
- In book collecting, the first edition is the earliest published form of a book. A book may have more than one first edition in...