A Dance to the Music of Time 08 - The Soldier's Art
The Soldier's Art is the eighth novel in Anthony Powell's twelve-volume masterpiece A Dance to the Music of Time, and the second in the war trilogy. It was published in 1966, and touches on themes of separation and unanticipated loss. The language, always exact, sometimes sardonic, also takes on the quality of blank verse in dealing with episodes that echo classical mythology. Memorable new characters like Finn are introduced with spare precision, but kept separate from the original participants in the Dance for several of whom this proves to be the last turn upon the floor.
A Dance to the Music of Time 09 - The Military Philosophers
The Military Philosophers is the ninth of Anthony Powell's twelve-novel sequence A Dance to the Music of Time. First published in 1968, it covers the latter part of Nicholas Jenkins' service in World War II. It depicts, with ironic detachment, a little-chronicled byway of the war effort, Allied Liaison. The author draws more directly here than elsewhere upon his own experience, and the novel adopts a tone at times close to that of diary, as it records the improbable events involving the allied military delegations, including the springing of a Polish officer from prison.
A Dance to the Music of Time 10 - Books Do Furnish a Room
Books Do Furnish a Room is a novel by Anthony Powell, the tenth in the sequence of twelve comprising his masterpiece, A Dance to the Music of Time. It was first published in 1971 and, like the other volumes, remains in print. The book conveys the atmosphere of post-war austerity in which the characters attempt to resume life before the intervention of the conflict. For the non-combatants this time-shift proves manageable, but others find themselves irrevocably altered by the experience, and ill at ease in a landscape that has changed both physically and socially.
A Dance to the Music of Time 05 - Casanova's Chinese Restaurant
Casanova's Chinese Restaurant is a novel by Anthony Powell. It forms the fifth volume of his masterpiece, the twelve-volume sequence A Dance to the Music of Time, and was originally published in 1960. Exploration of themes of time and memory are developed here. As with several of the earlier volumes, there is a substantial time-overlap with previous books, the first part returning to the period before the death of Mr. Deacon.
The Kindly Ones (1962) is a novel by Anthony Powell that forms the sixth in his twelve-volume sequence, A Dance to the Music of Time. Nonetheless the story stands up on its own and may be enjoyed without having read the preceding books. The novel captures the dying fall of the period between the wars, relating the run up to the Second World War to the circumstances prevailing just before the Great War. Hints abound that the vulnerable are to suffer, just as those driven by force of will begin their advance. Widmerpool is portrayed as one such, and a harbinger of war. As ever Nick is carried upon the tide of events, whilst seeking to do the honourable thing.
