65 Any Human Heart - William Boyd
Another great one from William Boyd. This was serialised for tv quite a while ago and long before I'd discovered him as a writer, so regretfully now, I wish I'd watched it.
The tale of Logan Mountstuart's life that spanned the 20th century and the pivotal moments of it, related via his journals.
Born in Montevideo in 1904 to a Uruguayan mother and a British father wealthy from his canned corned beef business. Logan's early years spent in South America, before the family returned to England, ostensibly for Logan's schooling. His formative years are where he makes two of his lifelong friends who will feature in Logan's trajectory as integral characters. Logan goes up to Oxford in the 1920s. At some stage around that time, his father dies, but not before telling his son he has left them well provided for. Hmm! I thought he had no idea what's coming down the line by way of the 1929 crash and mother had heavily invested via a dodgy American love interest and wheeler, dealer in stocks that will become worthless. Adjusting to reduced circumstances life goes on, Mountstuart having graduated with a third class degree, not what was predicted or what he hoped for, embarks on his life as a writer. There are affairs of the heart and a failed marriage, before meeting the love of his life Freya, just before departing to Spain to report on the Civil War. On his return to England, following an acrimonious divorce he marries Freya. During the 2nd WW he is recruited into Naval Intelligence and one of his tasks is to monitor the Duke of Windsor, which takes him firstly to Portugal where the Windsors are residing and later to the Bahamas. Later on at the closing stages of the war he is sent on an undercover mission to Switzerland where he finds himself interned. Back home tragedy strikes when his beloved Freya and their daughter Stella are killed in a V2 attack. Freya was his soul mate and linchpin.
Post war years Logan somewhat rudderless often in an alcoholic haze, there is an abortive suicide attempt whilst living in Paris. Decamping to New York he embarks on possibly what is an empty, louche period of his life during the 1950s, where he marries for a 3rd time, but that doesn't really work out either.. A further tragedy is to follow, having reconciled with his son from his first marriage who is also living in NY, the son, his only remaining child is to die from a drug overdose.
Returing to London Mountstuart then takes up a post as an English Lecturer in Nigeria where he reports on the Biafran War.
The 70s sees him retiring to London to a basement flat he bought in Pimlico after the War. At this time of his life he is
on a paltry pension, barely getting by, reduced to living on dog food (that made me feel queasy) A serious accident is to follow and spell in hospital, which he recounts as awful. Even more surprisingly he finds himself unwittingly signed up on the pretext of joining a political movement for change, to an offshoot of Baader Meinhoff. However agreeing to undertake a dangerous assignment, after which determined to extricate himself from their clutches takes advantage of a ramshackle property in southern France where he is to live out his final years. He sells up his London flat, uses some money to restore his French home, investing the rest to give himself a reasonably comfortable way of life in his new found abode. The dog food days are over and Logan manages to ingratiate himself to the local villagers. Logan is at his most philosophical at this juncture, musing on his personal peaks and all that he had lost, and how his life might have turned out so differently if those tragedies hadn't occurred. I can just see Jim Broadbent who was cast playing the older Logan, I imagine he'd have been perfect in that role.
I really loved it, shed a tear at the end as it was revealed posthumously that he had been working on his final book that was to be calledt Any Human Heart.
His early years are entertaining but the lists of talented, lovely, wonderful etc actors later on become tedious. Still, a nice book that doesn’t demand too much.