Hilary Spurling – författare

A unique reference book for all fans of Anthony Powell's 12-volume novel, A Dance to the Music of Time, which has become a literary landmark of twentieth-century writing. More than a simple glossary, Invitation to the Dance contains extensive Character, Book, Painting and Place indices, creating a magnificent database of Powell's imagination and England's cultural landscape. This is a masterpiece of 'extreme ingenuity' detailing over four hundred characters and one million words of Powell's lively fifty-year dance of fiction and fact. 'Hilary Spurling's exhaustive analysis of the novel's characters supplies a master-key for the reader of Anthony Powell.

Brilliantly compiled and presented by the celebrated biographer, Hilary Spurling, Elinor Fettiplace's Receipt Book has become a classic in the history of English cooking, and an extraordinarily intimate glimpse into the fabric of everyday Elizabethan life.'Hilary Spurling has done brilliantly ... Being both a scholar and a cook seems to be a rare combination than one might have expected.' Jane Grigson'Few cookery books are as important or as fascinating as this ... (Hilary Spurling's) scholarly and practical skills combined make the book much more than an antiquarian curiosity. It is a cookery book to use.' Victoria Glendinning, The Times'Hilary Spurling's research into Lady Fettiplace's family and background is stunning. She and her household do really come to life ... Hilary Spurling's pinpointing of her precise social standing and that of her intimates and acquaintances, of the kind of lives they led, consequently the kind of food they ate, the way it was prepared, preserved and so on, are all subjects of the greatest interest.' Elizabeth David

'It is a real cause for celebration when the best and most subtle literary biography of our time comes back into print, and in a single volume instead of the original two. What Hilary Spurling does, in a beautifully-written book, is to relate the life [of Ivy Compton-Burnett] intimately to the work and show in fascinating details, and with wonderful perception, how her subject's characters mirror aspects of her own nature. The book sends one back to read or re-read the novels - unfashionable, toweringly original tragic-comedies - the most individual novels, it may be, of our time.' The Good Book Guide'Atrue classic of the genre.' The Times'A biographical triumph ... Hilary Spurling's portrait - elegant, stylist, witty, tender, immensely acute -dazzles and exhilarates.' Literary Review