Shortlisted for the Costa Biography Novel Award 2020
The Booker Prize-winning author of The Sense of an Ending takes us on a rich,witty tour of Belle Epoque Paris,via the life story of the pioneering surgeon Samuel Pozzi
In the summer of 1885,three Frenchmen arrived in London for a few days'shopping. One was a Prince,one was a Count,and the third was a commoner with an Italian name,who four years earlier had been the subject of one of John Singer Sargent's greatest portraits. The commoner was Samuel Pozzi,society doctor,pioneer gynaecologist and free-thinker - a rational and scientific man with a famously complicated private life.
Pozzi's life played out against the backdrop of the Parisian Belle Epoque. The beautiful age of glamour and pleasure more often showed its ugly side: hysterical,narcissistic,decadent and violent,a time of rampant prejudice and blood-and-soil nativism,with more parallels to our own age than we might imagine.
The Man in the Red Coat is at once a fresh and original portrait of the Belle Epoque - its heroes and villains,its writers,artists and thinkers - and a life of a man ahead of his time. Witty,surprising and deeply researched,the new book from Julian Barnes illuminates the fruitful and longstanding exchange of ideas between Britain and France,and makes a compelling case for keeping that exchange alive.
Publisher: Vintage PublishingISBN: 9781529112313Number of pages: 280Weight: 450 gDimensions: 199 x 131 x 23 mm
MEDIA REVIEWS
'He paints a fin de siècle landscape of languid princesses,expensive whores,orgiastic balls...wit and a lot of gossip.'- The Times
'What a deliciously intelligent entertainment this is,couched in a prose of enviable suppleness... a master is at work here.'- Rupert Christiansen,The Daily Telegraph'One of his best books,very handsomely published too... (The Man in the Red Coat is) a bravura performance,highly entertaining.'- David Sexton,Evening Standard
'Do not google Samuel Jean Pozzi. If you want to enjoy Julian Barnes's The Man in the Red Coat - and believe me,it's teeming with delights - stay away from search engines and trust the author to tell the story in his own way... punctuated by the sound of gunshot...(this is a) brilliant,defiantly unconventional book.'- Adam Begley,Spectator
'The Belle Epoque is brought to life through three colourful lives in this sparkling account stuffed with top fin-de-siecle tittle-tattle.'- Robbie Millen and James Marriott,The Times
'Julian Barnes's wonderful The Man in the Red Coat surges round Belle Epoque Paris... a story full of digressions,white peacocks,missing limbs,amusing adverbs and fantastic clothes. An absolute tonic for grey winter days.'- Claire Harman,Evening Standard
Julian Barnes
Julian Barnes is one of England's leading literary novelists. He studied Modern Languages at Magdalen College,Oxford before spending three years as a lexicographer for the Oxford English Dictionary.
Visit the Julian Barnes author page
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