Bainbridge, Beryl (Vol. 4) | Bainbridge, Beryl 1933–
Bainbridge, Beryl 1933–
Ms Bainbridge is a British novelist. (See also Contemporary Authors, Vols. 21-22.)
This spare and lethal piece [The Dressmaker] must be one of the best novels of 1973. Within the most astringent limits Miss Bainbridge has created a sense of powerful emotions, has given a most tremendous sense of time and place. The writing is lithe, economical and muscular….
At no time does one get a sense that the writer has 'researched' and 'placed' her period and local colour. Pop songs, references, details of fashion, attitudes to the war and the Americans are natural and unforced. Miss Bainbridge, incidentally, uses a simple device that forces the reader to start again at the beginning immediately the last page is finished … and this is, if a touch artful, the most chilling touch of all.
Roger Baker, "'The Dressmaker,'" in Books and Bookmen, January, 1974, p. 71.
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