{"product_id":"9780385534093","title":"Sydney and Violet: Their Life with T.S. Eliot, Proust, Joyce and the Excruciatingly Irascible Wyndham Lewis","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eA long overdue biography of the power couple that nurtured and influenced the literary world of early twentieth-century England\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003e\"I write primarily to pay homage to a beloved friend, but also in the hope that some future chronicler of the history of art and letters in our time may give to Sydney and Violet Schiff the place which is their due.\"\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003e—T. S. Eliot, in a letter appended to Violet Schiff's obituary,\u003c\/i\u003e Times of London\u003ci\u003e, July 9, 1962\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eLargely forgotten today, Sydney and Violet Schiff were ubiquitous, almost Zelig-like figures in the most important literary movement of the twentieth century. Their friendships among the elite of the Modernist writers were remarkable, and their extensive correspondence with T. S. Eliot, Katherine Mansfield, Proust, and many others strongly suggests both intimacy and intellectual equality. Leading critics of the day considered Sydney, writing as Stephen Hudson, to be in the same literary league as Joyce, Eliot, and D. H. Lawrence. As for Violet, she was a talented musician who nurtured Sydney's literary efforts and was among the first in England to recognize Proust's genius and spread the word. \u003ci\u003eSydney and Violet\u003c\/i\u003e tells the story of how the Schiffs, despite their commercial and Jewish origins, won acceptance in the snobbish, anti-Semitic, literary world of early twentieth-century England, and brings to life a full panoply of extravagant personalities: Proust, Joyce, Picasso, Mansfield, Wyndham Lewis, T. S. Eliot, Aldous Huxley, and many more. A highly personal, anecdote-filled account of the social and intellectual history of the Modernist movement, \u003ci\u003eSydney and Violet\u003c\/i\u003e also examines what divides the literary survivors from the victims of taste and time.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47055694070000,"sku":"9780385534093","price":27.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/9780385534093_p0.jpg?v=1763694971","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/9780385534093","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}