Boris Ford (1917–1998)

Useful, informative, but academic and dated in approach. Can read as workmanlike, rather than joyful in the richness of the culture of the period.
Purchased over thirty years ago, I read the introductory essay then, which seeks to provide a brief historical framework to the artistic works discussed in the following chapters. I found the book at that time too academic for my taste, discussing too few works of which I had experience, and being variable in its depth of discussion of historic events.

Having recently read and been enthralled by Jenny Uglow’s Sybil and Cyril and Alexandra Harris’ Romantic Moderns, I wanted to read more around British culture in the 1920’s and 1930’s. I therefore revisited this book which looks at the period 1901-1939, and opens with Hardy’s poem, The Darkling Thrush.

The chapter on literature and drama (by Jacques Berthoud) offers brief but intense literary criticism of selected novels, contrasting James and Bennett, Conrad with Kipling, Hardy with Pound, Joyce with Woolf etc making an argument that writing of the period can be interpreted in terms of two axes, traditional-modern and serious-popular. This is dense analysis, and although interesting and focused, it reads as too serious and narrow.
A few popular works are name checked, but there is no analysis of the impact of popular culture. John Buchan and Erskine Childers get mentioned, but there is no reference to Agatha Christie and Dorothy L Sayers, or Milne and Nesbit. Drama discusses Shaw’s plays, but no mention of James Barrie, R C Sheriff and J B Priestley. Some of these names are mentioned in the introductory cultural setting essay, but I found the chapter on literature too high brow and restricted.
There follows chapters on the Garden City, Music, the Visual Arts and the “civilisation” of Bloomsbury.
John Summerson contributes a lively chapter on architecture, which shows a depth of knowledge worn lightly and occasional humour sadly lacking in the serious tone of the majority of the book.
There then follows chapters on the Documentary Film, Design and Industry, and John Laing’s Sunnyfield’s Estate.

I think my overall criticism of this overview of the arts in this book would be a relentless seriousness of delivery that often deadens the rich and varied culture of the period. The impact of mass popular culture is underrepresented, and the impact of American films, music and dance crazes is barely noted, as it was not British art. As the chapters on each art are written by different contributors, there is also detailed repetition, which would have benefited from more severe editing.… (mere)

This is the first volume of the wonderful old Pelican guides. While the approach is decided old fashioned, it is a useful and readable survey. The real value for most of us is in the excellently chosen anthology which comprises about half of the volume. Full poems or very extended excerpts cover the period. Readers familiar of Chaucer may find these considerably more difficult, but a sensible amount of annotation eases most of the difficulties, especially if you follow the editor's sensible advice to allow yourself to go along with the general flow of the narrative and not worry too much about each individual word or sentence.… (mere)