Review of "Late Fame" by Arthur Schnitzler

Having seen the film, I wanted to read the book...this turned out not to be so easy. It's a tiny book even with forenotes and afternotes, and there's only an expensive hardcover version for sale in the UK. Eventually I found an epub. It turns out that it wasn't published in Schnitzler's lifetime - it was going to be published in a Vienna newspaper, as a short story, but it outgrew that format. Then there was talk of serialisation, but the editor was against because it would break up the flow, so it went back into the drawer.

Probably a good decision - this is one of those cases where the movie was better than the book. It's got more depth and emotion.

Review of Late Fame

Went to see this film because it was on at the Crouch End Art House and we were staying in Crouch End. I thought it was great, Ruth didn't like it at all.

It's about a man who had a brief moment as a poet in the 1970s, and then fell from attention and stopped writing poetry. Now he works in a postal sorting office where he's a regular guy. But one day a smartly dressed young man turns up on his doorstep - he's been "rediscovered" by a little literary circle of young writers. They love him, shower him with enthusiasm, and he starts to hang out with them (even though they are a bit privileged and pretentious, and not obviously very talented), and especially with the glamorous Asian-American femme fatale actor who is part of the circle.

They plan to stage a literary evening to celebrate his reappearance, along with works of their own, and it eventually does happen, and it's not too disastrous, but he comes to realise that everything about them is fake, and he goes back to his old life and his regular-guy bar buddies.

I found it really interesting and moving, and was pleased to see at the end that it was based on a short story by Arthur Schnitzler, who had written "Dream Story" on which "Eyes Wide Shut" was based.