Letters from a life : the selected letters and diaries of Benjamin Britten, 1913-1976 /
Saved in:
| Author / Creator: | Britten, Benjamin, 1913-1976. |
|---|---|
| Imprint: | Berkeley : University of California Press, 1991-2012. |
| Description: | 6 v. : ill. ; 24 cm. |
| Language: | English |
| Subject: | |
| Format: | Print Book |
| URL for this record: | http://pi.lib.uchicago.edu/1001/cat/bib/1257768 |
| Summary: | These remarkable letters, never before published, constitute a comprehensive biography told largely in Britten's own words. Volume 1 accompanies him through prep and English public school and then to London to the Royal College of Music, where the young composer is plunged into metropolitan life and makes influential new friends, among them Auden and Isherwood. This was a time of prodigious musical creativity, a growing awareness of his homosexuality, and the dawning of his political convictions. It was during this time that Britten met Peter Pears, the partner with whom his musical and personal relationship was to last a lifetime. This volume closes in May, 1939, when Britten and Pears depart for the United States.<br> <br> Volume 2 offers an overview of a crucial period in American and British history, politics, and culture. Britten's experience of exile, his return with Pears to England to face recriminations as a Conscientious Objector and prejudice as a brilliant gay artist, and the triumph of his first major opera, Peter Grimes , are all outlined in letters which are a fascinating mix of the public and private.<br> <br> These first two volumes of the Selected Letters and Diaries --a further two are in preparation--make a fundamental contribution to Britten studies and to twentieth-century cultural history. |
|---|---|
| Item Description: | Subtitle, v. 3-6: the selected letters of Benjamin Britten, 1913-1976. Vol. 3-4 edited by Donald Mitchell, Philip Reed, and Mervyn Cooke; v. 5-6 edited by Philip Reed and Mervyn Cooke. Vols. 4-6 published: Woodbridge, Suffolk : Boydell Press, in association with the Britten-Pears Foundation. |
| Physical Description: | 6 v. : ill. ; 24 cm. |
| Bibliography: | Includes bibliographical references and indexes. |
| ISBN: | 0520065204 9780520065208 0520242599 9780520242593 1843833824 9781843833826 1843835916 9781843835912 9781843837251 1843837250 |
