I stayed in bed this morning beyond what anyone would consider a respectable time on an ordinary Thursday in February, because I just had to finish the book I was reading. What a book! I urge you to buy, borrow or steal a copy. Well, ignore the last option but you get my drift. This is one of those Amazon buys because: ‘if you liked that, you will like this.’ I’m sure you are familiar with that wheeze. I certainly don’t fall for it every time but in this instance, late at night, I did. And what a joy.
We are initially in Italy during the Second World War. In a deserted villa, sheltering in the cellar away from the bombing, a British soldier, Ulysses, shares a bottle of wine with an English woman, Evelyn, on her way to help rescue important art works in Florence. This is a meeting of hearts and minds, but not of romantic love, that will carry both characters through their lives and affect those around them.
I found myself thinking of the delightful film: Tea with Mussolini, with its stellar cast of Maggie Smith, Judi Dench and Joan Plowright. I half expected Evelyn to be stumbling over sandbags in the Uffizzi with Judi issuing instructions. I’m sure that was happening just around the corner.
After the war Ulysses returns to his east London home and a marriage that has gone awry. Evelyn is only a few miles away teaching art history but their paths do not cross, except in their minds. The author Sarah Winman weaves a complicated but satisfying plot that moves gradually forward until Florence becomes the place that a whole group of very disparate characters eventually call home.
This novel covers nearly eight decades and it is wide and generous and immensely pleasurable. EM Forster makes an appearance and a fascinating foretaste of ‘A room with a view’ is played out in a Florentine pensione. I was reminded of David Garnett’s book( he of the Bloomsbury set) ‘Aspects of love’ where we have all kinds of human love set before us.
Looking at the various reviews of the book, it is that of Sara Cox ( BBC Two’s Between the Covers) that makes me smile and nod in agreement: THE most beautiful book…it will stay with me for a long time.’