Confessions

A Life of Failed Promises

A. N. Wilson

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Hardback

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English

Bloomsbury
10 January 2023

Biography; Autobiography: literary; Memoirs

Here at last is the story of one of the leading contemporary critics, literary and otherwise, who has become celebrated for his waspish and subversive writing. As a writer, Wilson is polymathic. As the literary editor of the Spectator and Evening Standard he pioneered the commissioning of celebrity reviewers like the former Duchess of Devonshire and her sister Diana Moseley. He has published a number of well received novels but he is also the master of the biographer's art. His prize-winning biographies of C. S. Lewis and Tolstoy remain classics, and for the latter he taught himself Russian.

But now, Wilson turns the light upon himself. At Oxford, he married his tutor but then entered St Stephen's House to train for the Anglican priesthood. His portrait of this Anglican seminary and its high camp ethos is hilarious and full of anecdote, yet he also describes how he was on the threshold of a stellar career as writer and critic.

His account of being a Booker Prize judge is witty and cynical, as is his description of how his close friend the novelist Beryl Bainbridge failed for the fifth time to get beyond the Booker shortlist and finally win. The bridesmaid who never became the bride.

This sharp and gossipy memoir will delight Wilson's admirers who are legion. But it will also give others an exceptional insight into the charade which is the literary and publishing world in our times.

By: A. N. Wilson
Imprint: Bloomsbury
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions: Height: 234mm, Width: 153mm, Spine: 25mm
Weight: 454g
ISBN: 9781472994806
ISBN 10: 1472994809
Pages: 320
Publication Date: 10 January 2023
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

A. N. Wilson is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and holds a prominent position in the world of literature and journalism. He is a prolific and award-winning biographer and celebrated novelist. His novel, Winnie and Wolf, was longlisted for the Man Booker Prize. His last book The Mystery of Charles Dickens was published in 2020 to great critical acclaim and is at present being dramatized by Andrew Davies for British television.

Reviews for Confessions: A Life of Failed Promises

When you combine the deepest learning and the highest readability with the most plumptious story-telling, the result is A. N. Wilson ... * Stephen Fry * A. N. Wilson is the most enjoyably readable historian I know. * Antonia Fraser * A. N. Wilson is the supreme man of letters. He has conquered every field: journalism, novels, biography, history - and now memoir. He is planet-brained and very funny - a vanishingly rare combination. * Harry Mount * I am stunned, as I always am, by Wilson's humanity and brilliance and hard honesty. * Deirdre McCloskey * Distinguished literary figure A. N. Wilson's exquisite memoir tells the story of the wife he fell for as a student then betrayed - and the lifetime of lust and longing that led to a deeply poignant ending. * Daily Mail * A. N. Wilson has written many brilliant biographies and novels but never a memoir - until now. It was worth the wait. So exhilarating. And definitely not a failed promise. * Telegraph *