Post by tmesis on Sept 3, 2017 12:33:00 GMT
Had a busy day yesterday, matinee of Follies followed by Prom concert in the evening. Sandwiched in between I went to the pre-prom talk given by Hollinghurst. These talks, as some of you will know, last around 45mins and are then edited down to 20 mins to be broadcast that evening, as an interval 'feature' on Radio 3.
Now I'm a great fan of Hollinghurst and have read all his books; he was there really to plug his latest, yet to be published, called The Sparsholt Affair.
It has to be said, it wasn't the most riveting talk but it did make me want to buy the book.
What was most interesting though, was the audience reaction. I would say 50% hadn't a clue who he was. Most of the talks are related to the music that is about to take place in RAH but a fair number, like this are literary or history based. The best bits were when he read out parts of the new novel. There was a bit of fidgeting and embarrassed coughing when he read about a man observing another guy in a window opposite, describing in detail how beautiful his body was, but then in a later extract, the guy in front of me was visually and audibly squirming as he described two guys flirting with each other at a disco, including a bit of nipple licking - my description makes it sound quite tawdry; it was, of course, expressed in Hollinghurst's fabulously elegant prose.
Quite amusing really but also a bit pathetic in 2017. Now I could have understood it if he'd read out bits of The Swimming Pool Library!
Now I'm a great fan of Hollinghurst and have read all his books; he was there really to plug his latest, yet to be published, called The Sparsholt Affair.
It has to be said, it wasn't the most riveting talk but it did make me want to buy the book.
What was most interesting though, was the audience reaction. I would say 50% hadn't a clue who he was. Most of the talks are related to the music that is about to take place in RAH but a fair number, like this are literary or history based. The best bits were when he read out parts of the new novel. There was a bit of fidgeting and embarrassed coughing when he read about a man observing another guy in a window opposite, describing in detail how beautiful his body was, but then in a later extract, the guy in front of me was visually and audibly squirming as he described two guys flirting with each other at a disco, including a bit of nipple licking - my description makes it sound quite tawdry; it was, of course, expressed in Hollinghurst's fabulously elegant prose.
Quite amusing really but also a bit pathetic in 2017. Now I could have understood it if he'd read out bits of The Swimming Pool Library!
