House Arrest: Pandemic Diaries

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Bennett’s House Arrest, covering the Lockdown and Vaccination years, is little more than an Epilogue at a mere 49 pages – a bit longer than a Talking Heads monologue. So, my 4* rating reflects how good these 45 pages of musings were but don't reflect my disappointment! It is a typical Bennett moment, part gentle social comedy part revelation about the self-delusions of the ego. His television series Talking Heads has become a modern-day classic, as have many of his works for the stage, including Forty Years On , The Lady in the Van , A Question of Attribution , The Madness of King George Ill (together with the Oscar-nominated screenplay The Madness of King George ) and an adaptation of Kenneth Grahame's The Wind in the Willows .

However, the book really was too short to obtain a good idea of the author's thoughts during the lockdown periods. Where this tortured restraint does not reach, though, is into Bennett’s ethical worldview which remain as richly communitarian as ever. Perhaps to be expected as the author gets older, many of the entries sparked various reminiscences in him, which were interesting.

Bought today and have no idea when this was published but it feels just like sitting with Alan Bennett for a chat.

Many television, stage and radio plays followed, along with screenplays, short stories, novellas, a large body of non-fictional prose and broadcasting, and many appearances as an actor. He may clearly be increasingly frail but, even in lockdown, Alan Bennett retains his customary waspish wit in the latest tranche of his diaries ― Choice --This text refers to the hardcover edition.

The news that the cast and crew of the new Talking Heads series have agreed to take only a nominal fee and donate the profits to the NHS gives him a rare rush of pleasure in a world dominated by the bleak economics of Boris Johnson and Donald Trump.

Alan Bennett's collection of prose, Untold Stories, won the PEN/Ackerley Prize for Autobiography, 2006. Always a privilege to have the insight into someone’s diaries and in a way it feels like diaries during the height of the pandemic are even more intimate and personal than others. I hope they're not the thin end of a precautionary wedge lest Her Majesty end up swathed in protective get-up such as is worn at the average crime scene. As said I had already read this somewhere else, thought the book would be extra entries to his diaries of lockdown, but unfortunately not. In November 2020 he notices that the Queen, nearly 10 years his senior, is able to walk backwards when laying a wreath at the Cenotaph.Lacking any real insight or substance this collection of diary entries will likely leave you feeling slightly short-changed.