Christopher Isherwood has been appreciated for years as one of America's finest writers. Recent publications of biographies, essays of remembrances, and historically important data in the form of his diaries have established his place in history. That he had a longterm relationship with artist Don Bachardy is a well known fact and in truth much of the notoriety currently is due to Bachardy's continued devotion. Nowhere is there a more profound paeon to love than in this book of ink drawings. As Christopher Isherwood lay ill and dying his lover stayed by his side, savoring all the moments remaining in their temporal relationship. How best to while away his attentiveness than to draw Isherwood. These profoundly touching renderings show Isherwood's decline and finally his death, even drawings of his corpse as Bachardy waited for the body to be removed from their Santa Monica home. This is not a morbid book. This is a book that radiates love and chronicles time passing and life ending. It is one of the most tender elegies we have in art.

I have a bunch of audio books narrated by Alan Cumming, and I have to say that Mr. Norris Changes Trains and Goodbye To Berlin are the two best I ever heard. Maybe it's because that Alan was the Emcee in the musical Cabaret, for which these two books lent inspiration to. But for whatever reason, Alan brings you into the magical world of divine decadence in pre-war Berlin with Arthur Norris, the ideal of an enigma; Fraulein Schroeder, the chatty, light and amusing landlady; Otto and Anni, the next generation of Germans; and of course the narrator Chris. Alan knows what he's reading and because of his divine comprehension, he makes the recording sound so much more fun and enjoyable to listen to!

I knew Chris for many years. He had a wonderful irreverence for rules and organized religion, but was a deeply spiritual man. By the end of his life, you could feel a warmth of heart that came from his spirit.

Chris's approach to Vedanta is a delight for people who are interested in the true essence of religion.

I also appreciate his sense of humor that comes into the writing, as when he talks about Swami Vivekananda sleeping in a railway car one night, then sits across the street from a lady named Mrs. George Hale. As Chris wrote,

"Mrs. Hale was, fortunately, not a conventional woman.. She did not call the police and ask the stranger to move on. She did not even ring the servants to ask what he wanted. She noticed that he was unshaven, and that his clothese were crumpled and dirty, but she was aware also that there was a kind of royal air about him.... Mrs. Hale suddenly made a most intelligent guess; coming out of the house and crossing the street, she asked him politely,"Sir, are you a delegate to the Parliament of Religions?"

"She was answered with equal politeness, in fluent educated English..."

"The World in the Evening" is the story of Stephen Monk in the years before and during World War II. After his second marriage implodes, he retreats to his former home, a Quaker town in Pennsylvania, where he is forced to reflect on the whole of his life: his first marriage, his affairs, his inability to emote truthfully. Years ago, Stephen & his first wife travelled to the Canary Islands, where Stephen had an affair with a young man. After that ended in disaster, his first wife died, leaving Stephen confused and adrift. In the Quaker town, with family, and with friends in the form of a gay couple and a German refugee, Stephen confronts himself and ultimately finds inner peace. Isherwood's magnificent novel is as captivating and moving as it is beatifully written. The way the story ends is so full of hope and beauty that it will leave the reader feeling the same as Stephen.

First of all: Good concept. A day in the life. Isherwood's stream of consciousness is more readable than James Joyce's, whom I love for a different set of reasons. Second of all: A believable blend of the mundane and the transcendent. We catch the lead character George eating poached eggs for breakfast and masturbating in order to sleep at night. Before our eyes, he farts, fantasizes, converses with friends and co-workers, and generally just goes through his work day as an English professor at a state college in Los Angeles and his evening as a man seeking company.

If he's seeking company with special ardor, it's because he's lost his male companion, Jim, to an auto accident, something the dreary late autumn approach to Christmas makes even harder to bear. The ghost of Jim flits in and out of so many of the novel's passages. George makes connections throughout his day, but we see one by one how they fall short of the intimacy he shared with Jim. His best friend Charlotte "Charley" and he have the kind of witty, boozy conversation longtime pals might have, but Charley's efforts to turn things romantic crash into George's homosexuality. George has friends on his school's faculty who kibbitz with him over lunch about their shared left-leaning politics, but these are hardly deep bonds. Also, George has a sickening feeling that, despite his oratorial brilliance as a teacher, he's not really reaching his students.

George visits a dying woman, also involved in the Ohio car crash that killed Jim. Once upon a time, Doris was a rival for Jim's affection. George's ambivalent reaction to her sad condition, somewhere between grieving and vanquishing a foe, testifies to the unflinching honesty of this portrait.

George raves about the hour he spends at his health club, entering a lively sit-up competition with a 14-year-old he finds incipiently attractive. "How delightful it is to be here," Isherwood writes, "If only one could spend one's entire life in this state of easygoing physical democracy."

George's only hope for a full communion with another person comes with a happenstance nighttime meeting with one of his students, Kenny, at a beachside bar. The 60-year-old man and the 19-year-old youth enjoy smart, witty, and flirtateous conversation, which culminates in a Pacific Ocean skinny-dip and a visit to George's place. The visit is sensual but not sexual, leaving George short of the Jim standard again--but not without hope.

A ordinary day of an ordinary (but for his intellect) man. Why then is this book so spectacular? The prose flows. Check out these stunning sentences: (Of Doris dying in a hospital room) "Here on the table...is a little paper book, gaudy and cute as a Chrstmas card: The Stations of the Cross. Ah, but when the road narrows to the width of this bed, when there is nothing in front of you that is known, dare you disdain any guide?" (Of George diving into the ocean nude with Kenny) "He washes away thought, speech, mood, desire, whole selves, entire lifetimes, again and again he returns, becoming always cleaner, freer, less."

Isherwood's warts-and-all approach to his semi-autobiographical lead character is so refreshing! And the novel makes the most of its beautiful, decadent SoCal setting. Who would have thought that one of the greatest novels of the 20th century could be so simple and honest? I'll always love this book. It is my crystal ball, since I may be very much like George one day. Don't ask me in what ways!

This is the first Isherwood novel I have read and now I wonder why I waited so long. This is remarkably still fresh novel (despite some 60's historical references) about a gay man who has trajically lost his partner and is trying to move on with his life. A man who through it all loves life and see the humor and irony in daily living. As saying goes, "everything changes but still remains the same." Some readers see this book as "depressing" and a "downer" I see it as a all-too-ultra-real tale of a modern day gay male. While gay literature readers can sometimes get lost in the "fluff and buff gym boys at the beach reads", it is wonderful to see a novel that is a renewal of how gay literature can move and inspire generations of readers.

This was my fourth reading of this brilliantly perfect novel. I am deeply moved each time I reach this book; I cannot imagine how it would have affected me had I read it in 1964 when it was first published. This novel covers one day in the life of George, an English professor at a nondiscript college in California. The time is just before the Christmas season, that time in America dreaded by many of us who live alone. His lover Jim has recently died in a traffic accident. George is an outsider on many levels. He is British living in America, he is gay living in a heterosexual world, he is brillliant among mostly dull, uninteresting and uninterested college students, he is a man of good taste surrounded by tasteless neighbors.

Isherwood makes brillilant observations about people: that straight women friends often refuse to give up on making their gay male friends. "Do women ever stop trying? No. But, because they never stop, they learn to be good losers." And George says what I have been saying for years, that all too often minorities hate all other minorites. Another observation is that middle-aged gay men look better than their straight counterparts: "What's wrong with them [straight men] is their fatalistic acceptance of middle age, their ignoble resignation to grandfatherhood, impending retirement and golf. George is different from them because. . . he hasn't given up." Finally, Isherwood describes poignantly the unawareness of friends: "How many times, when Jim and I had been quarreling and came to visit you--sullking, avoiding each other's eyes, talking to each other only through you [haven't we all been in that awkward position]-- did you somehow bring us together again by the sheer power of your unawareness that anything was wrong?" There are countless gems like these through out this wonderful book.

A perfect novel about loss and loneliness, A SINGLE MAN constantly gets named near the top of "best gay" lists of books as well as one of the great novels of the 20th Century, both distinctions it richly deserves.

I don't know what to make of this book. It's a bit of a bore. This is due in part to the lack of a smooth narrative flow and its inexorable amount of difficult passages the reader must drudge through. Instead of being a pleasure to read it becomes a task. The book entices you with its characters but then makes you suffer to find fruition. It is still interesting however.

Berlin Stories is a wonderful book. I am reading it again it's so good!!!!!!! The writing is absolutely impeccable. Though I read it because of my obsession with the musical "Cabaret", I found it to be a great book in its own right. I think Isherwood would be proud of the current Broadway version of "Cabaret". I don't know what else to say:)

As another reviewer implies, Christopher Isherwood is a master of prose. He succiently and subtlely captures a time, places and people in 1930's Berlin. There are some wonderful characters including Sally Bowles, who is the model for stage version of Cabaret. Indeed, Isherwood, himself, in a forward to this book, tells us what happens when he meets Juliet Harris (?), who first plays Bowles on stage around 1959.

This is very easy to read; the events are a bit disheartening at times and the characters aren't always admirable--but they're very true to life. The reader, too, really gets a picture of how German people felt during the rise of Nazism. Highly recommended!

For those who never wanted "Berlin Stories" to end, "Prater Violet" will be a welcomed treat. Isherwood's fictions were, for the most part, only thinly veiled memoirs - indeed he plays a part in most without even the contrivance of altering his name. However, whether they be fact or fictions, these stories are original and delightful. Isherwood's adventures in the film colony of London prove irresistible. Each of the characters, Chatsworth, Ashmeade and the great director Friedrich Bergmann, are drawn with wit and clarity. What is most remarkable is how fresh this material is considering it was published in 1945. A very fine and rewarding short novel.

Isherwood's short novel is autobiographical fiction about being hired to write a screenplay for a movie called "Prater Violet" during early World War 2. There's lots of world politics, of course, as well as the politics of the worldwide movie industry (Hollywood included). Isherwood's writing is superb, and fills this brief space with a lush garden of a story. Here's a quote: "This business about the box office is just a sentimental democratic fiction. If you stuck together and refused to make anything but, say, abstract films, the public would have to go and see them, and like them..."

one of the best fictional portraits of a movie director, right up there with "white hunter, black heart." and isherwood's quiet, unforced, amused style is a joy.

if you're looking for a book on ramakrishna that's an easy read , this is it . its a good introduction , and one that probably goes down well with a reader not too familiar with hindu thought and hagiography . its a well organised book , covering the life of sri sri ramakrishna in approximate chronological order . too little has been said of his disciples , especially one titled "ramakrishna and his disciples " . don't expect an in depth look at ramakrishna (nor his disciples ), there are other books which delve more deeply . isherwood takes time to explain certain hindu concepts which should prove useful for the neophyte .

anyone with prior knowledge of ramakrishna's life would find this book a decent re-hash of material found in other books ( most notably those by the vedanta press ) . all in all , worth the buy .

It is one of the best books I've seen about Ramakrisna. It covers his whole life. There are many histories about his childhood very interesting and beautiful. It Talks about the disciples, mainly about Vivekananda. It's one of the best books I've read in my life. Highly recommended.

My qualification for this review is as an initiate practising samyana for 15 years. Of the many translations of Patanjali's Sutra's this is by far the worst I have ever read. I don't know who Swami Prhabavanda is but he certainly didn't impart any knowledge of value to Isherwood. The description of 'what meditation is' is totally incorrect to the extent of being the total antitheseis of what meditation is in reality, in relation to Patanjali. You can't get your understanding of a thing more wrong than that. Isherwood feels the need on occasions to compare Patanjali with religions such as Christianity, and such comparisons are not only irrelevant but do not hold true. The basic problem seems to stem from the fact that Isherwood has at best only a tenuous grasp of what he is writing about. He understands the words, but the actual concepts behind the words, are foreign to him. There are many far superior translations of Patanjali to be had. Don't waste your money on this one.

Swami Prabhavananda has done an excellent job of translating the sutras into understandable sentences - something that surpasses 90% of all other translators, and for this reason alone the book should be in everyone's library. The commentary however reaches neither the depth of of Satchidananda's "Sutras" nor the the burning insights of McAfee's "Beyond the Siddhis". It is obscure and sometimes confusing. All in all, however, an excellent book to add to the true seeker's bag of tricks.

Although this book is a study of Patanjali's Yoga Sutras, it will appeal to devotees of any religion--Hindu, Christian, or Buddhism--or to anyone interested in living a spiritual life. It is not so much a "how-to" guide in knowing God--for "there are innumerable approaches to him" (p. 66), as an examination of knowing one's real Self.

Patanjali's Sutras are dated sometime between the fourth century B.C. and the fourth century A.D. (p. 7), and they offer methods for gaining insights through our own experience into "the Godhead, the Reality which underlies this apparent, ephemeral universe" (p. 15). He observes that in order to know God, one must first cease identifying himself with the mind (p. 213). Our liberation, he tells us, is "retarded" by our past karmas, our fears and desires, our lack of energy (p. 52), our egotism, ignorance, and blind clinging (p. 55), and by such obstacles as sickness, mental laziness, sloth, doubts and despair (p. 64). However, the good news is that no effort to know God, however small, is wasted (p. 52), for God draws us to himself (p. 54). With a little exploration, it is possible to know God everywhere, "both within and without, instantly present and infinitely elsewhere, the dweller in the atom and the abode of all things" (p. 33).

Although I am not qualified to comment on their translation of Patanjali, Christopher Isherwood and Swami Prabhavananda's Vendantist commentary offers worthwhile insights into Patanjali's Sutras.

G. Merritt

I will admit to being slightly put off by the text when I first started reading it. However, once past the unique construction of grammar and syntax, it was an enjoyable experience. I found the filter of the English class system, homosexuality and 1920's mores an interesting perspective. I would recommend reading some of Isherwood's other texts before undertaking this one as many of the stories and characters are freely referenced and revealed in a truer light. The descriptions of Germany are unique to his age and thoroughly fascinating. The story of the man he tries to save from the Nazi's is interesting, but I particularly liked the end of the novel where he broaches the future and seeking love, and true companionship. Overall I fine read.

This book is one of a kind....brilliant, great, adventurous, a classic. Words do not describe it. Isherwood lays evertything on the table. He shows all his cards. This is one of the most exciting books I've ever read. I'm a college student and I skipped all of the ten thousand other books I have to read in order to read this one. It was not a waste of time. Once you get into this book it's a blast. The best part is following Isherwood across Europe. If you want the definitive feeling about the Modern Era read this book. You will get to know such characters as EM Forster, W.H. Auden, and Virginia Woolfe.....Gee, ever heard of them? This is the last great classic Isherwood wrote. I was so entranced by the words that I stayed up all night to finnish it. It's defintiely on my all time favorite list.

Christopher Isherwood makes it clear in his introduction that this book will be candid about his homosexuality. It begins with his move to Berlin and covers the time up to his move to America. There are fascinating anecdotes: the character of Sally Bowles (later made famous by "Cabaret") was named after the then unknown but handsome American Paul Bowles. Isherwood read E.M. Forster's "Maurice" in manuscript, decades before it was published. These are just a few. And note: his "Diaries: Volume 1" begins just *after* this book (the earlier diaries were destroyed)