Talk:Brideshead Revisited

Sebastian

Wasn't Sebastian the third son? After Bridey and Julia? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Schilippe (talk • contribs) 16:46, 5 March 2009 (UTC) Julia was a daughter —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.170.216.157 (talk) 20:29, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Catholic themes

I added a section on the Catholic themes of the novel. The previous version of the page was a bit unbalanced. The main theme seems to be Catholicism, yet the page only had 2 sentences to about this. On the other hand, it had 900 words under Gay Themes, which is a minor theme of the book. I got the content from this audio of a Catholic TV network: http://www.ewtn.com/vondemand/audio/seriessearchprog.asp?seriesID=6602&T1= --Nino Gonzales 09:48, 10 September 2005 (UTC)

Catholicism isn't the most important theme just because you think it is: you need to cite a credible reference for this statement. Gay themes are most certainly not a "minor theme" in the book, but rather an issue of frequent reference and much importance, albeit the treatment in the book is implicit and often oblique. I would say that both Catholicism/morality and LGBT issues are major themes worth serious treatment.CowboyBear (talk) 03:51, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

Why is this listed as an LGBT project, yet not put as related to Catholicism? Homosexual themes play a comparatively small part in the book; the major theme throughout is the action of Grace, and the reactions of the various characters to their faith (or lack). 82.108.42.66 (talk) 00:25, 11 December 2008 (UTC)Nefertum

Can you explain how Gay themes are in sonme way major in this book? The only stated homosexual character is Anthony Blanche - everything about Sebastian is just speculation. Imo Catholicism is the main theme, all the characters of substance find God in the last fifty or so pages. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.107.99.19 (talk) 18:30, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Literary analysis

The most important section I think is missing: a discussion of Brideshead Revisited as a novel. I think this should be the longest section (it's supposed to be a literary masterpiece). Maybe followed by one or two sentences on the Catholic angle and a line or two on the gay controversy. --Nino Gonzales 08:38, 16 September 2005 (UTC)

Rewrote the gay section

I rewrote the gay section. Here are some data that I deleted. They sound interesting but don’t seem to be pertinent to the article. Many of them seem to try to explain the general view of homosexuality at the time of the writing of the novel. I think these details make the article unbalanced. The relationship between Charles and Sebastian is after all a minor theme. (But even with these deletions, it is still one of the longest sections of the article). Maybe these would be useful for an article on how homosexuality was viewed in the early 20th century in England.

• Waugh's own brother Alec Waugh had caused considerable controversy by writing of homosexual conduct between English public school boys in in his autobiographical work The Loom of Youth
• some later editions of the book (written between 1940 and 1943) published postwar excise passages making mention of eugenics or degeneracy as taboo in the wake of Hitler's Final Solution.
• Lord Marchmain's character was based upon the Earl Beauchamp, who was outed as a homosexual to George VI by his cousin, the Duke of Westminster.
• One theory that seems to find some degree of concurrence is that Sebastian is driven to drink at least in part by uncertainty regarding his sexuality and possibly (though this view is far less widely-agreed) out of despair at Charles' increasing attachment to his family, which indeed he specifically foreshadows early in the book.

I retained most of the original data. However, all of them do not have sources. To whoever wrote them: it would be great if you could cite your sources :) --Nino Gonzales 08:29, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

I really think the fact that "Lord Marchmain's character was based upon the Earl Beauchamp, & was outed as a homosexual to George VI by his cousin, the Duke of Westminster" should have stayed, and information on the novel being mentioned in cartoons and situation comedies on American television should go. Like Lord Marchmain, Earl Beauchamp (Who was the man about whom the King, horrified, said ("I thought men like that shot themselves) went into exile on the Continent. After Beauchamp's daughter Sibell Rowley died in October 2005, many things previously unsaid were at last uttered: this was the family that inspired Brideshead Revisited; the 3rd daugther was an alcoholic; the younger Dorothy had an unfortunate late marriage to Robert Heber "Mad Boy" Percy, former boyfriend of Lord Berners. The daughters were aware of their father's nocturnal prowlings, and would warn their boyfriends to lock their bedroom doors. Problems became more serious, involving incidents with footmen; the campaign mounted by the Duke of Westminster drove Beauchamp into exile.(Though it is not clear the Duke ever made his wife, the Earls sister, understand the actual problem: "Bendor says that Beauchamp is a bugler" [sic] , she once said.) - Nunh-huh 06:04, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

-- The gay section still is longer than any other. Sebastian's character is absent for much of the book, after all, noone has really written about Julia, Rex or Lord Brideshead yet.

-- What on earth is the problem with you people? It was a romantic friendship between men (rather intensely romantic, but still). It's very simple. It doesn't have any connection with sexual behaviour between men. —Ashley Y 10:36, August 13, 2005 (UTC)

-- Have just reduced the length of this section, which was rather poorly composed, without effecting the content. Agree with above that this is better contextualised in terms of early 20th Century British attitudes towards homosexuality, rather hope someone will do this. If not, I'll give it a go. VenusianCat 21:14, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

• The passage "Others draw an alternative conclusion from the line "our naughtiness was high on the list of grave sins", although the "naughtiness" in question could refer to the boys' gluttony, not to mention the sloth and greed that characterize their carefree days, rather than homosexual acts per se." reminds me of a sentence in Agatha Christie's "Wittnes for the prosecution".

"What hypocrites you Englishmen are..." ;) Robert Prummel 12:11, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

By the way, the horrendous remark "I thought men like that shot themselves" is usually attributed to George V. Wasn't he King in 1931 when Beauchamp was driven into exile?

Mad World [Hardcover] Paula Byrne (Author) Harpercollins 2009 (publisher) This biography on Waugh is a factual, thoughtful consideration of Waugh homosexual views. Unfortunately it will not satisfy those who demand photographic substantiation .~~user Andy Hickes — Preceding unsigned comment added by Andyhickes (talk • contribs) 22:29, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

I agree that the section on Charles's relationship with Sebastian is too long. Nearly the whole second paragraph could go. The bit about "low door in the wall" being some "Freudian metaphor for homosexual sex" is just silly, and that it's an allusion to Alice is completely irrelevant. Looking at "our naughtiness [was] high on the catalogue of grave sins" is necessary, however, but the implication that it does not refer to "sodomy" because "drunkenness and gluttony" are also grave sins that "Charles and Sebastian certainly indulge in" isn't very persuasive. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states that a grave sin "is specified by the Ten Commandments." Drunkenness and gluttony do not violate the Ten Commandments; "sodomy" does (because "adultery" is considered to cover all sexual sins). Also, the mention just before of indulgence in "silk shirts and liqueurs and cigars" kind of hints at these other alleged grave sins and would make "naughtiness" rather redundant. Christopher Hitchens wrote that "the catalogue of grave sins" referred unambiguously to homosexual sex and that it "puts the quietus on the ridiculous word 'platonic' that for some peculiar reason still crops up in discussion of the story" (http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2008/sep/27/evelynwaugh.fiction). Dadsnagem (talk) 22:14, 4 February 2012 (UTC)

The following sentence, from this article, is surely "ridiculous": "The precise nature of Charles and Sebastian's relationship remains a topic of debate; whether they are simply close friends or if Waugh hints at a sexual relationship between the two is not definitely established", It is furthermore contradicted by the lede: "and the nearly overt homosexuality of Sebastian Flyte's coterie at Oxford University". It is only "nearly overt" because the novel was published in 1945. See the following comment (partially quoted in the previous comment):

"Now, that summer term with Sebastian, it seemed as though I was being given a brief spell of what I had never known, a happy childhood, and though its toys were silk shirts and liqueurs and cigars and its naughtiness high in the catalogue of grave sins, there was something of nursery freshness about us that fell little short of the joy of innocence."

This sentence, incidentally, puts the quietus on the ridiculous word "platonic" that for some peculiar reason still crops up in discussion of the story. Christopher Hitchens, "It's all on account of war", The Guardian, 27 September 2008. [3].

See also: "The arrival in Oxford in October 1922 of the sophisticated Etonians Harold Acton and Brian Howard changed Waugh's Oxford life. Acton and Howard rapidly became the centre of an avant-garde circle known as the Hypocrites, whose artistic, social and homosexual values Waugh adopted enthusiastically; he later wrote: "It was the stamping ground of half my Oxford life"" (the Wikipedia article on Waugh). Rwood128 (talk) 13:27, 23 January 2017 (UTC)

References

"The following sentence, from this article, is surely "ridiculous": "The precise nature of Charles and Sebastian's relationship remains a topic of debate; whether they are simply close friends or if Waugh hints at a sexual relationship between the two is not definitely established", It is furthermore contradicted by the lede: "and the nearly overt homosexuality of Sebastian Flyte's coterie at Oxford University".". No the lede doesn't contradict it; Sebastian's coterie at Oxford, and Charles' & Sebastian's relationship, are two different things. In terms of your other point(s), the novel and Waugh's own life are also two different things. In terms of quoting and citing independent opinions about the novel, that is allowed, but your Guardian link appears to be broken. Softlavender (talk) 13:44, 23 January 2017 (UTC) Link fixed.

Are you, Softlavender, suggesting that, (1) there is no relationship between Waugh's experience at Oxford and the novel? and (2), that while Sebastian's coterie at Oxford was homosexual he wasn't?

Amongst many things that overtly suggest that this novel deals with male love are: Ryder and Sebastian's total lack of interest in women at Oxford; the attitude of the narrator Ryder at the beginning of Chapter One – 'Here, discordantly, in Eights Week, came a rabble of womankind [...], twittering and fluttering', etc. I'm inclined to doubt that the 'precise nature of Charles and Sebastian's relationship remains a topic of debate'. Certainly the section on this topic does not provide solid evidence for this. What do the critics have to say? Rwood128 (talk) 17:38, 23 January 2017 (UTC)

Sebastian's coterie at Oxford, and Charles' & Sebastian's relationship, are two different things. The novel and Waugh's own life are also two different things. In terms of quoting and citing independent opinions about the novel, that is allowed, from reliable sources. Please remember to indent your talk-page posts to properly nest them under the post you are replying to; I have done that for you above. Softlavender (talk) 04:42, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

Featured article?

This is a pretty good little article. Well balanced, covers everything, not too long nor tooshort. Personally I think BR is rather like a pavlova - pretty and sweet and ultimately not very nutritious - but nevertheless let's recognise the merit of this addition to Wikidom.

Opening

I added a picture of the dust jacket, and a sentence or two to the opening about what Waugh felt the book was about. Going straight to information about the TV adaptation seems to overlook that it is primarily a novel. thewikiman

Sequel

I added a short section referencing the (truly terrible) unauthorised 2003 sequel. Do you agree that this is relevant to the article?Brideshead 18:55, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

It seems to be trivia... so I included it in the Trivia section...--Nino Gonzales 02:57, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Snobbery

The section header itself seems to be POV. Could anyone think of a header that captures what seems to be the nostalgia for England's age of nobility? It seems the Marchmain family represents the last of a dying breed.--Nino Gonzales 02:57, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Another instance of snobbery is wanting to suppress any mention of the influence of this on pop culture. Anton Mravcek 21:36, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

It absolutely is. This would be an entirely forgettable piece of British literature if it didn't have any references in American mythology. In fact, if this article went for deletion, I'd vote "Keep" only because of the pop culture references. ShutterBugTrekker 23:15, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Mm, yes, quite. Cromulent Kwyjibo 23:54, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Separate article for TV programme?

Does anyone agree that Charle's Sturrage's TV adaptation of Brideshead Revisited deserves a seperate article of its own? I know it's widely considered one of the high watermarks of independent British TV and I personally think it would be good to have a more through article on it. I'd create one myself but unfortunately my capabilities on Wikipedia are somewhat limited, but if anyone agrees and could create the article I'd be happy to flesh it out.

Revised edition

What is the difference between the revised edition and the original? Njál 20:05, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

Wikified the categories

I wikified the categories in the article. As of March 15 2007, they were broken. I'm not sure whether all of these categories should be retained, but I'll leave it to y'all to make a decision on that. Cheers! --82.207.201.138 17:00, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Just for completeness: In my edit, I also removed the following text which stood forlornly at the end of the article (after the links), without any proper purpose, as I feel.

Brideshead Revisited Brideshead Revisited Brideshead Revisited (boek) Gjensyn med Brideshead En förlorad värld --82.207.201.138 17:22, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Plot summary

Hi:

I've never read the book, it's one of those titles I keep meaning to get around to. So, in a spare moment, I looked it up here and make the following suggestion about the plot summary: Can it please be re-written so that it makes a modicum of sense to someone who hasn't already read the book?

Thanks.

AG —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 69.157.181.30 (talk) 22:43, 7 April 2007 (UTC).

I'll second that, it also needs to be trimmed and the character list folded into it.Ktlynch (talk) 12:16, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

Cites, please

The section "Motifs and other points of interest" contains a great many uncited assertions. Without cites, these are merely the opinions of the editor(s), and don't belong in a Wikipedia article. -- 201.37.229.117 (talk) 17:06, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:BRIDESHEAD.jpg

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Use of possessive

Standard English uses one possessive when referring to one common thing shared by two possessors. "Robert and Mary's wedding." "Bill and Brian's friendship." "Joanna and Mary's apartment." It is at least confusing and unnecessary (and possibly incorrect) to say, on the other hand, "Robert's and Mary's wedding." (That is, unless you wanted to say something along the lines of -- "I have seen the throwing of rice at two weddings, Robert's [wedding] and Mary's wedding." That's why I am undoing the addition of an apostrophe in "Charles and Sebastian's relationship." theloavesandthevicious (talk) 23:02, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

Questions

Regarding these sentences from the article:

"During the Second World War, Charles, now an army officer after establishing a career as an architectural artist, is housed at Brideshead, once home to many of his affections. It occurs to him that builders' efforts were not in vain, even when their purposes may appear, for a time, to be frustrated."

My questions are:

1) Why was billeted changed to housed? (I'm just curious, not disagreeing.)

2) What on earth is the second sentence meant to convey? And how is it relevant? Wanderer57 (talk) 20:24, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm still hoping for an answer to the second question. Please and thanks. Wanderer57 (talk) 17:39, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Holy late edits. Billeted is the correct term for housing a soldier. The second sentence means that the chapel, built for the worship of God, is now being used for its purpose, despite being closed up for many years. Greglocock (talk) 23:06, 5 April 2024 (UTC)

Marriage to Charles

Quoting the article:

"Julia decides that she can no longer live in sin, and for that reason can no longer contemplate marriage to Charles."

This suggests that marriage to Charles would involve "living in sin". How so? Is something missing here? Wanderer57 (talk) 17:37, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

It would involve divorcing her husband...

21:11, 22 September 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Moerwijk (talk • contribs)

To be clear, Julia is Catholic, and the Catholic Church does not allow divorce. So even if Julia were to divorce her husband (dissolving their legal marriage) and then go through the form of an Anglican marriage with Charles, in the eyes of the Catholic Church she would still be married to her first husband, and her relations with Charles would be adultery. 76.118.82.108 (talk) 00:09, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

References in other media

A very minor suggestion: the American TV series "The Twilight Zone" from the 1960's had an episode entitled "Deaths-Head Revisited" (#74, 3rd season, Nov. 10, 1961). This must allude to the novel under discussion, though I can see no real connection beyond the title. 82.181.39.239 (talk) 10:54, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Separate character articles merger

I find it odd that two characters have separate articles (Lord Sebastian Flyte, Anthony Blanche) besides the articles themselves probably failing notability, they don't really serve a purpose that isn't covered in this article's plot and character sections. I propose we merge them back into this article.24.190.34.219 (talk) 18:14, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

Agree. Better to merge the articles. MidnightBlue (Talk) 18:53, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

Merge them.Ktlynch (talk) 12:17, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

Agreed. Hadrian89 (talk) 15:42, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

Oppose merge. I think they serve as much purpose as any good character articles. And since they are too long to merge or add, and no one has even tried to, I'd say keep them as is. Softlavender (talk) 12:49, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

Publication history

I think this article needs a section about the book's publication history. I have not been able to find who published the first edition in England. It would be interesting to know just how many editions it's gone through, how many languages it's been translated into, etc. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.250.214.35 (talk) 00:01, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

I agree, especially because later editions of the book contained substantive changes (trimming some of the more purple prose, and inserting more detailed physical descriptions of some of the characters that had real life counterparts). I'll try to get round to it. Hadrian89 (talk) 15:39, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

Brideshead

If I am correct, the Marchmain stately home in Wiltshire was never referred to as a 'castle' (as in 'Brideshead Castle') but it is rather a mansion. The term 'Brideshead Castle' which I deleted in favour of simply 'Brideshead' may stem from the 1981 Granada Television series in which Castle Howard was used as the setting for Brideshead. Castle Howard itself is not a castle, but rather a Baroque mansion. If anyone has evidence that Waugh called the home a castle, please revert my edit. Jm3106jr (talk) 22:44, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

You're not correct. In Chapter Three Sebastian writes to Charles from "Brideshead Castle, Wiltshire" and in Chapter Four the following conversation takes place between them:

'Why is this house called a "Castle"?'

'It used to be one until they moved it.'

'What can you mean?'

'Just that. We had a castle a mile away, down by the village. Then we took a fancy to the valley and pulled the castle down, carted the stones up here, and built a new house. I'm glad they did, aren't you?'

Opera hat (talk) 12:46, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

Identity of Charles Ryder

Seriously, why is Charles identified with artist Felix Kelly? Seriously people, it's clear that if anyone Charles is Waugh himself -- his Oxford homosexuality, his closeness with the Lygons, his conversion to Catholicism. This wiki article is frustratingly lacking and innaccurate, but that at the very least should be fixed and mentioned. Softlavender (talk) 06:39, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

External links modified

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Mass changes

Damiantgordon, please get consensus on this talk page before making such massive unexplained changes to the article. Softlavender (talk) 23:45, 24 August 2016 (UTC)

Apologies Softlavender, you're right. What I am proposing is that in the "Adaptions" section rather than just have the links to adaptions (that are at the head of the page anyway) I'm proposing we expand that section out the following text, what do people think?

===Television===

From October–December 1981, Brideshead Revisited was adapted as an 11-episode TV serial produced by Granada Television and aired on ITV, with Claire Bloom as Lady Marchmain, Jeremy Irons as Charles Ryder, and Anthony Andrews as Lord Sebastian Flyte. The bulk of the serial was directed by Charles Sturridge, with a few sequences filmed by Michael Lindsay-Hogg, John Mortimer was given a credit as writer, but most of the scripts were based on work by producer Derek Granger.

===Radio===

To mark the 70th anniversary of its publication in 2003, BBC Radio 4 Extra produced a four-part adaptation, with Ben Miles as Charles Ryder and Jamie Bamber as Lord Sebastian Flyte. This version was adapted for radio by Jeremy Front and directed by Marion Nancarrow. It was repeated on BBC7[19][20]

===Film===

In 2008 Brideshead Revisited was developed into a feature film, with Emma Thompson as Lady Marchmain, Matthew Goode as Charles Ryder, and Ben Whishaw as Lord Sebastian Flyte. The movie was directed by Julian Jarrold and adapted by Jeremy Brock and Andrew Davies. Damiantgordon (talk) 09:08, 25 August 2016 (UTC)

Also, there is a section called "References in Other Media" with three bullet points, the final bullet point is about a book, which is most certainly _not_ a different media to this article, and since it concerns the development of the book we could put it in a new section "Concept and Creation" (which seems to be standard for the development of UK books), what do people think? Damiantgordon (talk) 09:08, 25 August 2016 (UTC)

I like the way you have fleshed out the Adaptations section above; that's certainly more useful to the reader than a bunch of links. I would put them in chronological order though, especially since the miniseries was far and away more faithful and more successful than the film. In terms of Referencs in Other Media, a book is a form of media, and that book is different from this book, so it is in the correct section. It shouldn't be in a section called "Development", because this isn't a movie and thus it was never "in development". If there were ever a section on "Background" (or similar heading), we could put the book stuff there. I think there may be more information on real-life correspondences in the Evelyn Waugh article, or maybe also in the article on the miniseries(?). Certainly there is abundant material available on who the characters were modeled after or what parts of Waugh's real life were reflected in the book, and so on -- we would simply need more than one source though (in my opinion) for that kind of section. Softlavender (talk) 09:40, 25 August 2016 (UTC)

Also, please remember to use an edit sumary for every edit. Thanks! Softlavender (talk) 09:42, 25 August 2016 (UTC)

Agreed on all points, thank you for your courteousness on this. Damiantgordon (talk) 11:28, 25 August 2016 (UTC)

Suggested new lede 4/12/16

Softlavender, your total reversion of my new lede seems a quite excessive reaction to a single factual error. It would have been perfectly easy to edit-in a reference to English stately homes in addition to Oxford. The current lede does not summarise the article, as it is meant to. It contains much material that is not represented in the article. It is clearly suitable for transferring, whole and complete, to a new opening section titled ‘Background’, as I suggested.

I will not re-revert at this stage, because I dislike edit-wars. But you may care to reconsider the function of the lede on Wiki pages. Valetude (talk) 11:13, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

Nostalgia for an age of English nobility

This section is very weak. Rwood128 (talk) 14:16, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

New Section???

Dear Sir,

Already a time ago I did add an new section but I see it is not there. Procrustes???

Regards, 145.129.136.48 (talk) 19:53, 31 March 2018 (UTC)

It was deleted per WP:NOTAFORUM. Wikipedia is not a forum or message board to discuss the subject of the article or ask questions about the subject of the article. This talkpage is for discussing improvements to the Wikipedia article. Softlavender (talk) 22:04, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

Lede Improvements

I removed the bit about "the nearly overt homosexuality of Sebastian Flyte's eccentric friends at Oxford University" for the reasons I gave in my edit summary ('the only part of sebastian's circle described at all is antony blanche, and he is an overt homosexual ("inverted", "pansy", etc)'). I guess you could also say that one other person is described: Boy Mulcaster. However, it's not clear whether he's really supposed to be part of that circle or not (I don't think he's mentioned as being at the initial lunch party Sebastian invites Charles to, even though he is shown to be there in the series). And he doesn't seem to me to be portrayed as even slightly homosexual. I think you could make the case that romantic friendships are a major theme, but I don't want to write that stuff myself. The homosexuality (overt/implied/whatever) of Sebastian's circle at Oxford is definitely not a major theme. It can't be because the circle itself is not even a subject.

My own opinion is that Waugh is very deliberately saying "Maybe they are homos, maybe they aren't, that's not the point." And as if to belabor that point he contrasts them with Anthony Blanche, who's explicitly identified as homosexual. I also suspect that at least one partial reason for this was because of Waugh's own homosexual affairs at Oxford: he wants to downplay the importance of actual homosexuality in these sorts of relationships. Instead they're mostly about aesthetics & deep romantic friendship, and maybe there's a bit of gay sex thrown in, or maybe not, who knows? But while the first part you can arguably get from just reading & summarizing the book, the latter part would definitely be original research. Dingsuntil (talk) 20:58, 13 August 2021 (UTC)