Sue Roe – författare

'Her first full work of the charged Modernism that would come to define her' Paris ReviewJacob Flanders is a young man passing from adolescence to adulthood in a hazy rite of passage. From his boyhood on the windswept shores of Cornwall to his days as a student in Cambridge, his elusive, chameleon-like character is gradually revealed in a stream of loosely related incidents and impressions: whether through his mother's letters, his friend's conversations, or the thoughts of the women who adore him. Then we glimpse him as a young man in 1914, caught under the glare of a London streetlamp as Europe is on the brink of war. This tantalizing novel heralded Woolf's departure from the traditional methods of the novel, with its experimental play between time and reality, memory and desire.Edited with an Introduction and Notes by Sue Roe

'Heady, lively, engaging...brings Montmartre's heyday back to life' Sunday Times'Brilliant' GuardianThe real revolution in the arts first took place not, as is commonly supposed, in the 1920s to the accompaniment of the Charleston, black jazz and mint juleps, but more quietly and intimately, in the shadow of the windmills - artificial and real - and in the cafés and cabarets of Montmartre during the first decade of the century. The cross-fertilization of painting, writing, music and dance produced a panorama of activity characterized by the early works of Picasso, Braque, Matisse, Derain, Vlaminck and Modigliani, the appearance of the Ballet Russe and the salons of Gertrude Stein.In Montmartre is the fascinating story of the birth of Modernism in Paris. Full of life, colour and squalour, and incredible painting and sculpture, Sue Roe vividly brings to life the bohemian Parisian art scene between 1900-1910.

Manet, Monet, Pissarro, Cézanne, Renoir, Degas, Sisley, Berthe Morisot and Mary Cassatt. Though they were often ridiculed or ignored by their contemporaries, astonishing sums are paid today for the works of these artists. Their dazzling pictures are familiar - but how well does the world know the Impressionists as people? In a vivid and moving narrative, biographer Sue Roe shows the Impressionists in the studios of Paris, rural lanes of Montmartre and rowdy riverside bars as Paris underwent Baron Haussman's spectacular transformation.For over twenty years they lived and worked together as a group, struggling to rebuild their lives after the Franco-Prussian war and supporting one another through shocked public reactions to unfamiliar canvasses depicting laundresses, dancers, spring blossom and boating scenes. This intimate, colourful, superbly researched account takes us into their homes as well as their studios and describes their unconventional, volatile and precarious lives, as well as the stories behind their paintings.

'Supercharged. Highly colourful . . . they're all here, the big names of the time - behaving badly, and, at times, quite madly too' ObserverDuring the 1920s, in the Parisian neighbourhood of Montparnasse, a unique flowering of avant-garde artistic creativity became the cradle of Dada and Surrealism. In this crowd biography, Sue Roe tells the story - from Duchamp to Dali, via Man Ray and Max Ernst - of the salons and cafes, alliances and feuds, love affairs and scandals, successes and suicides of one of the most important and long-lasting artistic achievements of the twentieth century.'Describes with plenty of colour how surrealism, from Rene Magritte's bowler hats to Salvador Dali's watches, was born and developed' The Times'Brings together some of the chief protagonists in one of the 20th century's most inventive art movements. A vivid read' Radio Times

A WATERSTONES BOOK OF THE YEAR'A compelling tale . . . Brilliantly insightful and well-written.' - TimesFernande Olivier, Olga Khokhlova, Marie-Therese Walter, Dora Maar, Francoise Gilot, and Jacqueline Roque. These six extraordinary women shared Pablo Picasso's life and were instrumental in his career, yet they have long been dismissed as simply passive models or muses.Hidden Portraits reveals that their lives were - without exception - remarkable. All six were unconventional, independent and talented. All six were tested, both by Picasso's subterfuges and betrayals, and the wider social turbulence they lived through. The extent to which each influenced Picasso's art in major new directions has never been fully acknowledged.Sue Roe delves deeply into the truth of the women's experiences for the first time, to tell the story of Picasso's women from their point of view. Her enthralling book spans seventy years, from Bohemian early twentieth century Montmartre to the glittering Riviera in the 1920s, through Paris under Nazi occupation and beyond Picasso's final years of seclusion.The result is a riveting, atmospheric read about six fascinating and charismatic women, outstanding in their own time, whose individual stories have up to now been glossed over or hidden from view.

A WATERSTONES BOOK OF THE YEAR'A compelling tale . . . Brilliantly insightful and well-written.' - TimesFernande Olivier, Olga Khokhlova, Marie-Therese Walter, Dora Maar, Francoise Gilot, and Jacqueline Roque. These six extraordinary women shared Pablo Picasso's life and were instrumental in his career, yet they have long been dismissed as simply passive models or muses.Hidden Portraits reveals that their lives were - without exception - remarkable. All six were unconventional, independent and talented. All six were tested, both by Picasso's subterfuges and betrayals, and the wider social turbulence they lived through. The extent to which each influenced Picasso's art in major new directions has never been fully acknowledged.Sue Roe delves deeply into the truth of the women's experiences for the first time, to tell the story of Picasso's women from their point of view. Her enthralling book spans seventy years, from Bohemian early twentieth century Montmartre to the glittering Riviera in the 1920s, through Paris under Nazi occupation and beyond Picasso's final years of seclusion.The result is a riveting, atmospheric read about six fascinating and charismatic women, outstanding in their own time, whose individual stories have up to now been glossed over or hidden from view.