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Dancing In The Dark

Caryl Phillips Janet Hobhouse

$24.99

Paperback

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English
Vintage
01 November 2006
A brilliant and affecting novel based on the tragic life of a hero of American entertainment.

'The funniest man I ever saw, and the saddest man I ever knew.' This is how W.C. Fields described Bert Williams, the highest-paid entertainer in America in his heyday and someone who counted the King of England and Buster Keaton among his fans.

Born in the Bahamas, he moved to California with his family. Too poor to attend Stanford University, he took to life on the stage with his friend George Walker. Together they played lumber camps and mining towns until they eventually made the agonising decision to 'play the coon'. Off-stage, Williams was a tall, light-skinned man with marked poise and dignity; on-stage he now became a shuffling, inept 'nigger' who wore blackface make-up. As the new century dawned they were headlining on Broadway. But the mask was beginning to overwhelm Williams and he sank into bouts of melancholia and heavy drinking, unable to escape the blackface his public demanded.
By:   ,
Imprint:   Vintage
Country of Publication:   United Kingdom
Edition:   New edition
Dimensions:   Height: 198mm,  Width: 129mm,  Spine: 14mm
Weight:   159g
ISBN:   9780099488873
ISBN 10:   0099488876
Pages:   224
Publication Date:  
Audience:   General/trade ,  ELT Advanced
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Active

Caryl Phillips was born in St Kitts and now lives in London and New York. He has written for television, radio, theatre and cinema and is the author of three works of non-fiction and seven novels. Crossing the River was shortlisted for the 1993 Booker Prize and he has won the Martin Luther King Memorial Prize, a Guggenheim Fellowship and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize, as well as being named the Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year 1992 and one of the Best of Young British Writers 1993. His most recent book was A Distant Shore which won the 2004 Commonwealth Writers Prize

Reviews for Dancing In The Dark

It is a lovely novel, psychologically astute and rich in period detail, and the best thing Caryl Phillips has written - Max Davidson, Sunday Telegraph This is a tragic story with not a word wasted, raised to an elegiac level by Phillips's supple, controlled prose Sunday Independent A subtle and poignant novel... A fine and beautifully nuanced performance Sunday Times A compassionate portrait of an enigmatic figure... Written with Phillips's trademark understated elegance The Times Phillips has brilliantly resurrected a bitter-sweet life... Without a doubt Phillips' most accomplished novel Time Out


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