Spanning the first five years of the 1970s, this installment of Frederic Raphael's view of his own life is at once intimate and detached, a detachment made palpable by months spent in the French farmhouse he purchased at the end of the booming 1960s. Although seemingly poised to direct and write many more films, the slump of the 1970s instead leaves the writer free to concentrate on fiction again. Lesser-known personalities whose unguarded stories and characters provide fodder for inspiration are his primary focus, although sketches of prominent film and literary world figures such as Arnold Wesker, Norman Jewison, and Sean Connery also appear. Presented here is a moving portrait of an author in the thick of creating who he is, what he wants to say, and how.
