tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-664958436931528900.post5497522365571377887..comments2024-02-27T07:15:23.786+01:00Comments on Simon's Book Blog: Olivia Manning: The Great Fortune (1960)Simon McLeishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16433000161180042201noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-664958436931528900.post-89398610355207235652009-10-17T08:07:04.078+00:002009-10-17T08:07:04.078+00:00As with the Plautus review, I realised when moving...As with the <a href="http://simonsbookblog.blogspot.com/2009/05/titus-maccius-plautus-pot-of-gold-and.html" rel="nofollow">Plautus review</a>, I realised when moving old website reviews to this blog that I'd already reviewed <i>The Great Fortune</i> there. So here are the sections from the old review that I've not effectively repeated here.<br /><br />Second World War novels featuring Eastern Europe are not all that common in English, but even if Olivia Manning's Balkan Trilogy didn't have the setting almost entirely to itself, it would still be a classic sequence of novels. The Great Fortune, the first of the trilogy, is set in still neutral Roumania during the period at the beginning of the conflict known as the Phoney War.<br /><br />The novel is structured around the contrast between the familiar Britishness of the Pringles and the exoticism of pre-War Roumania, a country which combined a wealthy ruling class - it was a rich country because of its oil reserves and agricultural fertility - and poverty as grinding as the poorest countries of today, with starving peasants and hordes of professional beggars. A corrupt and incompetent government, trying to manipulate the British and Germans to their own advantage while the populace is terrified of Russian aggression following the invasion of Finland, has brought Bucharest to the point of chaos, frittering away the country's wealth that is the great fortune of the title.<br /><br />In some ways, The Great Fortune reminds me of Anthony Powell's A Dance to the Music of Time novels, with the same satirical air; but for me Manning is more successful. The interest provided by the background is sadly lacking in Powell's novels, even the ones set during wartime, and Manning is able to solve the plotting problem Powell had with coincidence (both having a small group of characters constantly running into one another by chance) by setting her work in the small emigré community. The absurdities caused by the culture clash between the English and the Roumanians are to me much more felicitously reminiscent of some of my favourite humourous short stories, Lawrence Durrell's Antrobus collections. (The resemblance is particularly strong in description of the production of Troilus and Cressida.)Simon McLeishhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16433000161180042201noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-664958436931528900.post-66223836188408659182009-03-02T18:09:00.000+00:002009-03-02T18:09:00.000+00:00A long-time favorite of mine; purchased both The B...A long-time favorite of mine; purchased both The Balkan Trilogy and The Levant Trilogy at an Edinburgh book store back in 1991. Admit I had not heard of Manning or her works until I watched the BBC mini-series "Fortunes of War."Sashahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05077998621423860472noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-664958436931528900.post-86964449902718149612009-01-03T23:25:00.000+00:002009-01-03T23:25:00.000+00:00Hi, I've just bought the Balkan Trilogy because I ...Hi, I've just bought the Balkan Trilogy because I enjoyed an earlier novel by Olivia Manning. I was looking for positive reviews before I embarked on a 600+ page novel. Interesting post, thanks.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com