Awards

• Short-listed for Sheridan Morley Prize for Best Theatre Biography 2009
• Shortlisted for Sheridan Morley Prize for Best Theatre Biography 2009.

Overview

'All theatre enthusiasts are indebted to Henry Irving and Ellen Terry- and now also to Michael Holroyd for bringing their families back to dazzling life' - Sir Ian McKellen Henry Irving - a merchant's clerk who became the saviour of British theatre - and Ellen Terry, who made her first theatre appearance as soon as she could walk, were the king and queen of the Victorian stage. Creatively interdependent, they founded a power-house of arts at the Lyceum Theatre, with Bram Stoker as business manager, where they recast Shakespeare's plays on an epic scale and took the company on lucrative and exhilarating international tours. In his masterly new biography, award-winning writer Michael Holroyd explores their public and private lives, showing how their artistic legacy and their brilliant but troubled children came to influence the modern world.

Full Product Details

9780099497189

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Reviews

Holroyd has a wonderful eye for detail...an entirely captivating biography...one of the glories of the form Guardian It has all the tumbling narrative, spicy detail and easy empathy that determine his midas touch... shows Holroyd yet again pushing the biographer's art to new imaginative planes Financial Times Magnificent - not just as a fascinating exercise in group biography, but as a masterpiece of comic writing...such joie de vivre New Statesman This is a fabulous cavalcade of a book, written with infectious verve and deep imaginative sympathy ... a joy to read -- John Carey Sunday Times All theatre enthusiasts are indebted to Henry Irving and Ellen Terry: and now also to Michael Holroyd for bringing their families back to dazzling life -- Sir Ian McKellan

This is a fabulous cavalcade of a book, written with infectious verve and deep imaginative sympathy ... a joy to read Sunday Times He writes with eloquence and clarity, sketching the broader context with a light but firm touch and incidentally providing a literary masterclass in the marshalling and sifting of detail Literary Review '[Holroyd's] own uncanny powers of balance, perception and penetration [appear] in a multiple biography that somehow recaptures an ephemeral imaginative reality more intense to its subjects and their public than life itself Observer Holroyd has a wonderful eye for detail...an entirely captivating biography...one of the glories of the form Guardian Magnificent - not just as a fascinating exercise in group biography, but as a masterpiece of comic writing...such joie de vivre New Statesman It has all the tumbling narrative, spicy detail and easy empathy that determine his midas touch... shows Holroyd yet again pushing the biographer's art to new imaginative planes Financial Times Through a rapidly evolving, scene-changing narrative, presented with a range of eye-catching effects Holroyd evokes the mysterious world of the Victorian and Edwardian theatre, the hiss of the gas footlights, the coloured lights and smoke, with all the attention to detail of the star-struck fan seated in the front stalls Independent on Sunday All theatre enthusiasts are indebted to Henry Irving and Ellen Terry: and now also to Michael Holroyd for bringing their families back to dazzling life Holroyd's sweeping biography...proceeds at a furious pace, and, in less expert hands, the detail packed onto the page might bewilder; instead, the effect is of an epic, perfectly balanced by intimacies of setting and character. The New Yorker

Author Information

Besides the biographies of Augustus John, Bernard Shaw and Lytton Strachey (which was filmed as Carrington), Michael Holroyd has written two volumes of memoirs, Basil Street Blues and Mosaic. He was president of the Royal Society of Literature from 2003 - 2008 and is the only non-fiction writer to have been awarded the British Literature Prize. He lives in London and Somerset with his wife, the novelist Margaret Drabble.

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