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Awfully Dark And Awfully Witty: Beryl Bainbridge

© Pamela St. Clair

In an interview at the Writer's Digest online site, Beryl Bainbridge remarks, "I've always done short books. I write much more, but I throw it away because it's too much. I think it was Voltaire who wrote a letter to a friend and said, 'I'm sorry this letter is so long. I didn't have time to make it shorter.' I agree with that. I think you have to be sparse about it. "

Set in the 1950's, An Awfully Big Adventure (1989) follows Stella, a theater intern who is filled with adolescent insecurity, as she matter-of-factly searches for her sexual and professional identity amid an atmosphere riddled with the farcical antics of those struggling to resume, initiate, or conceal love affairs. The novel weighs in at a frugal 205 pages, yet the hefty world it evokes teems with quirky, sympathetic characters fleshed out with crisp dialogue and pithy, exacting descriptions. Consider a scene where Stella and her fellow intern Geoffrey have just witnessed a macabre, surreal accident wherein a young man trips and falls and kills himself by severing an artery with the sheet of glass he is carrying under his arm. Typically stoic, Stella seems largely unaffected by the tragedy, unlike an established self-absorbed actor (is that redundant?), who is distraught upon merely hearing about the accident:

"St. Ives was particularly affected by the incident. 'Dear God,' he said, 'why does life have to be so bloody awful,' and he blew his nose emotionally. Dotty wasn't there to cosset him, and presently he went upstairs to the wardrobe, where Prue made him a cup of tea."

Stella's critical honesty about her own shortcomings, which are mysteriously associated with her mother's absence (Stella has grown up and lives with her aunt and uncle) contrasts starkly with the insincere histrionics of St. Ives and others in the cast. Poignantly, her self-reproof coupled with her naiveté misleads her to develop her own character less upon what experience teaches her and more upon inexact or misconstrued second-hand knowledge.

Stella falls in love with Meredith, the play's director, and decides that he is the one to to whom she will lose her virginity, despite the fact that Meredith pines away for his lover Hilary, who has recently jilted him. When Meredith entrusts Stella to dispatch a telegram to Hilary, Stella, torn with jealousy, rips up the sentimental entreaty and substitutes a caustic missive of her own. Her plan backfires, for as she later learns from the older actresses (all who are unsuccessful in love), the best way to attract someone is to behave as if you want nothing to do with him.

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