Critics have tended to split Evelyn Waugh into two authors: the hysterically funny satirist who wrote books like "Vile Bodies" and "The Loved One," and the very conservative Catholic writer who gave us "Brideshead Revisited" and other works. Patey shatters this shallow understanding, demonstrating convincingly that Waugh's satire, like Swift's, is solidly based on a system of positive values -- in Waugh's case, pre-Vatican II Roman Catholic religion. Patey's treatment of this aspect of Waugh, so central to him as a writer and as a man, is simply masterful. I have always found this side of Waugh distasteful, but through Patey, I found myself pulled into an intense and exciting dialogue with Waugh and his beliefs. The treatment of Waugh's life is equally superb. Perhaps more than any other genre, satire requires a knowledge of its historical context to be appreciated. Patey seems to know everything about everyone Waugh ever met, and to have read and understood everything Waugh might ever have read. He has synthesized it all and delivered it in a prose style so clear and unobtrusive that you don't appreciate it until you reflect on what he's accomplished with it. And he lets Waugh make all the jokes. There's much about Waugh to dislike, but Patey provides an understanding of the man and his art that reconciles us to him. And besides, how can you hold a grudge against an author who names a character Aimee Thanatogenous?

If anyone who wishes to learn more about the life and the works of Evelyn Waugh, this may not be the biography for him. Currently, there are three major biographies of Waugh-Stannard, Sykes, and Patey. Stannard's work is cumbersome, and often his prose is awkward, but it is certainly well worth reading for its inclusiveness. Sykes is more of a reminiscence of friendship, including anecdotes that he was privy to. Patey is the first author of apply high literary criticism to Waugh in the kind of form that a professor is apt to do. He responds specifically to continual problems raised in Waugh scholarship and provides far more coherent and concrete answers than Stannard or Sykes even attempt. He organizes the biography with an eye on chronology, but also addresses issues thematically which is brilliant, and simple, but what few literary biographies do. Bravo Mr. Patey! Thank you very much for your hard work on this matter. His biography is also meticulously footnoted.

Though half the length of the other standard biographies (Sykes, Stannard, and Hastings), Patey's book is more interesting and more insightful. He provides a context for Waugh's thoughts, so that some of EW's positions seem less strange. Patey also defends Waugh's books against the vicious criticism to which they have often been subjected. Another strength is Patey's explanation of what redeems even the non-Catholic characters. The surprising answer: the ability to love. Patey doesn't carry this point all the way through, and sometimes he seems too sympathetic to Waugh. Still, I'd rather re-read his biography than any of the others.