6.8 /10 1 Votes6.8
Language English Originally published 1976 Country United Kingdom | 3.4/5 Goodreads Publication date 1976 Publisher Hutchinson OCLC 16364951 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Pages 155 pp (hardback edition) ISBN 0-09-128400-7 (hardback edition) Similar Anthony Burgess books, Speculative fiction books | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
In search of anthony burgess made in monte carlo beard s roman women
Beard's Roman Women is a 1976 novel by British novelist Anthony Burgess.
Contents
- In search of anthony burgess made in monte carlo beard s roman women
- Plot introduction
- Characters
- References
Dated "Montalbuccio-Monte Carlo-Eze-Callian, Summer 1975", according to Burgess it was written in the back of his Bedford Dormobile as he and his wife, Liana Burgess toured Europe and "partly in the bedroom of a small hotel run by Swiss homosexuals" (You've Had Your Time).
The novel is set in Rome and is apparently based on Burgess's experience of being widowed in the mid-1960s. Burgess's wife, Liana, is depicted as Paola Lucrezia Belli in the novel.
Photographs in the original edition were by David Robinson.
Plot introduction
Ronald Beard jets off to Hollywood and meets Paola Lucrezia Belli, an Italian photographer and descendant of the Roman dialect poet Giuseppe Gioacchino Belli. Various comic adventures ensue as the narrative switches to the Eternal City.
The book is an interesting companion piece to Burgess's next novel, Abba Abba (1977): the Roman setting (some 150 years apart), references to the poet Belli, and the focus on the Romantic poets. In Abba Abba John Keats is the main character; here it's Byron and Shelley as the subject of a screenplay by the main character.