Description

‘Barbara Pym is one of my most favourite novelists. Few other writers have given me more laughter and more pleasure’ – Jilly Cooper

‘I’m a huge fan of Barbara Pym’ – Richard Osman

‘Could one write a book based on one’s diaries over thirty years? I certainly have enough material,’ wrote
Barbara Pym. This book, selected from the diaries, notebooks and letters of this much-loved novelist to form a continuous narrative, is indeed a unique autobiography, providing a privileged insight into a writer’s mind. It includes a forward from bestselling author – and Barbara Pym fan – Jilly Cooper.

Philip Larkin wrote that Barbara Pym had ‘a unique eye and ear for the small poignancies of everyday life’. Her autobiography amply demonstrates this, as it traces her life from exuberant times at Oxford in the thirties, through the war when, scarred by an unhappy love affair, she joined the WRNS, to the published novelist of the fifties. It also deals with the long period when her novels were out of fashion and no one would publish them, her rediscovery in 1977, and the triumphant success of her last few years.

It is now possible to describe a place, situation or person as ‘very Barbara Pym’. A Very Private Eye, at once funny and moving, shows the variety and depth of her own story.

Praise for A Very Private Eye:

‘It increases the understanding and enjoyment of her novels enormously’ – Auberon Waugh, Daily Mail

‘The perfect complement to the fiction’ – Paul Bailey, The Observer

‘Her sharp and very private eye never failed her’ Victoria Glendinning, The New York Times

Publisher Review

I'd sooner a new Barbara Pym than a new Jane Austen -- Philip Larkin Barbara Pym's unpretentious, subtle, accomplished novels are for me the finest examples of high comedy to have appeared in England during the past seventy-five years . . . Spectacular * The Sunday Times * Barbara Pym has a sharp eye for the exact nuances of social behaviour * The Times * An alert miniaturist . . . Her novels have a distinctive flavour, as instantly recognisable as Lapsang tea * The Daily Telegraph * One does not laugh out loud while reading Barbara Pym; that would be too much. One smiles. One smiles and puts down the book to enjoy the smile. Then one picks it up again and a few minutes later an unexpected observation on human foibles makes one smile again -- Alexander McCall Smith My favourite writer . . . I pick up her book with joy, as though I were meeting an old dear friend who comforts me, extends my vision and makes me roar with laughter -- Jilly Cooper So quintessentially English . . . If you read A Very Private Eye, you'll discover there all the quietly remarkable qualities that caused the publishing world to reverse itself about her * The New York Times * Barbara Pym is the rarest of treasures, she reminds us of the heart-breaking silliness of everyday life -- Anne Tyler Pym makes me smile, laugh out loud, consider my own foibles and fantasies and, above all, suffer real regret when I reach the final page -- Mavis Cheek