Mr Norris Changes Trains: Christopher Isherwood (Vintage classics)

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British-born American writer Christopher William Bradshaw Isherwood portrayed Berlin in the early 1930s in his best known works, such as Goodbye to Berlin (1939), the basis for the musical Cabaret (1966). Isherwood was a novelist, playwright, screenwriter, autobiographer, and diarist.

Mr. Norris Changes Trains | The Modern Novel Isherwood: Mr. Norris Changes Trains | The Modern Novel

Norris has a predilection to being dominated and beaten. A severe young lady named Anni with long boots and an assortment of whips provides him with the equivalent of sexual release in the form of controlled torture. To Norris, Anni is a beauty beyond earthly compare. Nei primi giorni di marzo, dopo le elezioni, il tempo si fece d’improvviso mite e caldo. “E’ il clima di Hitler” diceva la moglie del portinaio; e suo figlio osservava scherzosamente che dovevamo essere grati al giovane Van der Lubbe, perché l’incendio del Reichstag aveva sciolto la neve. “Un così bel ragazzo” osservò la signora Schroeder con un sospiro. “Come mai può aver fatto una cosa tanto terribile?”. La moglie del portinaio sbuffò. Disordine, miseria, lezioni private di inglese, riunioni di comunisti, sedute private masochistiche con frusta e stivali, interrogatori di polizia, orge, raggiri e misteri, fughe e ritorni: “I am a camera”, ha scritto Isherwood. Book Genre: 20th Century, British Literature, Classics, Cultural, European Literature, Fiction, Gay, Germany, Historical, Historical Fiction, LGBT, Literature, Novels, QueerIn 1945, Isherwood published Prater Violet, fictionalizing his first movie writing job in London in 1933-1934. In Hollywood, he spent the start of the 1950s fighting his way free of a destructive five-year affair with an attractive and undisciplined American photographer, William Caskey. Caskey took the photographs for Isherwood’s travel book about South America, The Condor and The Cows (1947). Isherwood’s sixth novel, The World in the Evening (1954), written mostly during this period, was less successful than earlier ones.

Mr Norris Changes Trains by Christopher Isherwood Mr Norris Changes Trains by Christopher Isherwood

Isherwood sketches with the lightest of touches the last gasp of the decaying demi-monde and the vigorous world of Communists and Nazis, grappling with each other on the edge of the abyss.

Unauthorised use and/or duplication of this material without written permission from this blog’s author is prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that the material is credited and referenced to JacquiWine’s Journal with appropriate and specific direction to the original content. Thank you. As far as the novel itself goes, I was expecting something more. I imagined that there would be a much closer look at the debauched lifestyles being led in Berlin by the Bright Young Things of this period, something closer to a Vile Bodies in Berlin than I found but that aside the characters are wonderfully drawn (most natably the fabulous titular character of Mr Norris) and the relationship between Bradshaw and Norris is terribly entertaining. And what did they use to give you on Sundays?’ he was asking as I came in. ‘We got pea-soup with a sausage in it. Not so bad.’ Norris is a Communist, and also a masochist. His character is brilliantly drawn by Isherwood, with his classic wit and sly humour, but he is also veiled in mystery, which the progression of the novel slowly unravels. It isn’t quite as enjoyable or illuminated as Goodbye to Berlin, but still a brilliant read.

Mr. Norris Changes Trains by Christopher Isherwood | Goodreads

The whole city lay under an epidemic of discreet, infectious fear; I could feel it, like influenza, in my bones. You guys out there in gigabytes land all know I have a serious problem with Solipsistic Autism. You want fries with that? Just sayin, so you know the purely fictional headspace I’m coming from… William meets Mr Norris on the train in the first chapter, and, sadly, there aren’t that many trains afterwards. Sadly, as I love reading about what happens on the trains. Mr Norris, while keeping up the appearances of a refined Englishman of delicate sensibilities, seems rather murky.By the way, popular culture betrayed Isherwood twice here. Just tell a female friend of yours what given name the surname "Bradshaw" (the main narrator of this novel) brings to her mind and there you are: Carrie.