From the first page A Book of Secrets casts the spell of a time long gone, of loves endured and lost, expectations dashed on the rocks of reality, of inner desires forever stilled, casting their shadows into history. It is written with the kind of elegance, ease and simplicity possible only from a master craftsman who has flown far beyond any learning curve and is relishing his free fall. He carries us as if on a magic carpet from one character to the next, and one time period to the next, with consummate grace. Holroyd is a kind of Fred Astaire on the page, his many steps becoming one grand, profound design.
—The New York Times Book Review
Master raconteur and biographer of Bernard Shaw and Lytton Strachey, the always elegant Holroyd is at the top of his game in the final installment of a trilogy (after Basil Street Blues and Mosaic)—sadly for the world of publishing, he says it is his swan song. In this dizzying group biography, relating to the significant women in the 60-year lifespan of Ernest Beckett (who died in 1917), second Lord Grimthorpe, Holroyd explores not only the well-known life of Violet Trefusis, the novelist and notorious lover of Vita Sackville-West, but also Alice Keppel, with whom Grimthorpe sired the illegitimate Trefusis; and Eve Fairfax, muse to Auguste Rodin, as well as Grimthorpe’s onetime fiancée (she lived to almost 107 without marrying). Much of the book is also devoted to the delicious ins and outs of the biographer’s art, in which Holroyd has few peers. Getting together with Gore Vidal in the novelist’s Italian aerie (which was built for one of Grimthorpe’s legitimate children) is just one of the highlights of guilty-pleasure name-dropping. Holroyd writes like an angel and memorably draws the rivulets of these fluid lives together. 8 pages of b&w illus. (Aug.)
“Intoxicating . . . Burst[s] with the tremendous generosity of its author . . . From the first page A Book of Secrets casts the spell of a time long gone, of loves endured and lost, expectations dashed on the rocks of reality, of inner desires forever stilled, casting their shadows into history. It is written with the kind of elegance, ease and simplicity possible only from a master craftsman who has flown far beyond any learning curve and is relishing his free fall. [Holroyd] carries us as if on a magic carpet from one character to the next, and one time period to the next, with consummate grace. Holroyd is a kind of Fred Astaire on the page, his many steps becoming one grand, profound design . . . [H]is heart and humor bounce in vibrant rays off every hot-blooded, lovelorn, crazy, jealous and joyous woman--and what enlightened being would have any woman be otherwise?--in his book . . . A Book of Secrets is a book of magic, a sleight of hand by a master conjurer singing his swan song, sweetly, softly, with piercing wit and overwhelming compassion, his poetry in prose evoking a time past, with all its outrageous obsessions, its illegal passions, its melancholy perfume.” —Toni Bentley, The New York Times Book Review
“Michael Holroyd is that rare biographer who is read for himself as much as for the sake of his subject . . . It is hard to see how Mr. Holroyd could do better than this book.” —Carl Rollyson, The Wall Street Journal
“A Book of Secrets frequently casts a rosy comic glow . . . Mr. Holroyd is an impeccable writer and researcher, a man whose books are packed with intricate detail yet retain a buoyancy. They are aerodynamic; they run as silently as gliders . . . This book is a richly marbled meditation not only on the lives of several remarkable women but also on the art of biography itself . . . [Holroyd's] new book contains many fine moments during which, holding on with white knuckles, you might hear yourself cry, ‘Brilliant!'” —Dwight Garner, The New York Times
“Master raconteur and biographer of Bernard Shaw and Lytton Strachey, the always elegant Holroyd is at the top of his game . . . Holroyd writes like an angel and memorably draws the rivulets of these fluid lives together.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“A Book of Secrets is truly a book of revelations, of sudden, emotional jolts . . . The work of a master-biographer at the height of his powers . . . A beautifully structured narrative, punctuated by surprises and dazzling shifts in focus.” —Daisy Hay, The Daily Telegraph
“It's a testament to Holroyd's dexterity that this big, densely populated canvas never feels cluttered or confusing . . . As is always the case with Holroyd, the reader comes away equally inspired, equally curious, and lavishly entertained by a story-teller of the first rank.” —Lee Randall, The Scotsman
“Richly evocative and beautifully written . . . Holroyd's skills as a researcher and detective are fully deployed, in miniature; and only a master could pull off such a book.” —Anne Chisholm, The Spectator
In his preface Holroyd calls this the "third and final volume in a series that began with Basil Street Blues." That book was a memoir of his youth; this one is more biographical and labyrinthine. Eminent biographer Holroyd (Lytton Strachey: The New Biography) inserts himself into the book as he describes his investigative path in exploring the life of Ernest Beckett, second Baron Grimthorpe, and the women (wife, mistresses, daughters) in Beckett's life, centering on the Villa Cimbrone in Italy. Readers familiar with Edwardian England will recognize and learn more about Alice Keppel, mistress of the future Edward VII, and her daughter Violet Keppel Trefusis, among others. Eventually, Holroyd meets and travels with Beckett's granddaughter to the villa. VERDICT The book is best for the reader well studied in this era and its learning; it has untranslated French and Latin phrases scattered throughout. Fans of the exploits of the early 20th-century British nobility and literary aristocracy will enjoy this gently entertaining history. The lack of source notes will make it hard, however, to trace the documents from which Holroyd quotes.—Megan Hodge, Randolph-Macon Coll. Lib., Ashland, VA
An elegiac work of literary archaeology by the knighted British biographer of Bernard Shaw and Lytton Strachey.
As the third volume of his memoirs—afterBasil Street Blues (2000) andMosaic (2004)—which similarly offer an intriguing mix of biography and autobiography ("I seek invisibility behind the subjects I am trying to bring alive on the page"), Holroyd (A Strange Eventful History: The Dramatic Lives of Ellen Terry, Henry Irving, and Their Remarkable Families, 2009, etc.) focuses here on the lives of two Bloomsbury-era women who were linked to the same man. Visits to the literary mecca Villa Cimbrone in Ravello, Italy, put the author on the track of a former owner of the house, an English dilettante, ex-banker, widower and Edwardian patron of the arts, Ernest Beckett turned Lord Grimthorpe, who commissioned a bust in 1901 from Rodin of Beckett's fiancée, Eve Fairfax, only to jilt her soon after. Left with the bill, Evenonetheless charmed the great, now-aged French sculptor, and over the next eight years their friendship flowered. The bust eventually sold (with his permission) in order to help support this intelligent, cultured woman who would remain unmarried and of scant independent means. Holroyd was able to locate Eve's precious diary, which he calls her book of secrets, in which she accumulated autographs, photos of dear friends, scraps of poems and memories that record what she believed was a "useful" life. The other main protagonist is the legendary literary sprite, novelist and muse Violet Trefusis, Beckett's illegitimate daughter. Holroyd delved into the novels and life of Trefusis, delineating her torrid, life-transforming affair with Vita Sackville-West, and he quotes amply from their correspondence for a lively, satisfying adventure. Literary enthusiasts will delight in this lovely narrative for its own sake.
Purportedly Holroyd's "last book," this is an elegant literary study by a seasoned biographer and wonderfully engaging writer.
