Books we like ... and books we're not too fussed about
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Diana Athill
Granta Books 2009
“One doesn’t necessarily have to end a book about being old with a whimper, but it is impossible to end it with a bang. There are no lessons to be learnt, no discoveries to be made, no solutions to offer. I find myself left with nothing but a few random thoughts. One of them is …. that although a human life is less than a blink of an eyelid in terms of the universe, within its own framework it is amazingly capacious ….”
Diana Athill’s conclusion is typical of her memoir as a whole: contemplative, reflective, and expressed in elegant and admirably clear prose. She tells something of her life as an editor and publisher, and something of her love affairs - all of which have, I gather, been covered in more depth in her other autobiographical works. The large part of the book, however, is devoted to chapter length ruminations, from the perspective of a woman nearing ninety, on subjects as diverse as childlessness, aged driving, painting, and gardening. They reminded me of Paul Johnson’s elegant weekly essays on esoteric topics in the Spectator. In our youth-obsessed culture it is refreshing to hear from an elderly woman still excited by life and still with something to say. That said, although I was never bored by this book, I am not very sure what I gained from reading it. In particular, although I learned much about Athill and her attitudes, the picture I gained of other people and of the times she lived in was hazy indeed. However, I’m probably being unfair, as this isn’t what she set out to do. What she did set out to do, she does very well indeed - and her controlled, considered prose, unaffected by the whims of fashion or self-conscious pretension, is certainly refreshing.
2nd July 2009
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/jan/05/diana-athill-memoir-costa-interview
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