A Field Guide to the British by Sarah Lyall
In 1996 Sarah Lyall, a New York Times reporter, left behind her American roots and moved to London for love. As that newspaper's correspondent in London, she became known here for her witty and incisive dispatches from her adopted country, as she conjured with her new and eccentric countrymen. She also found herself with a ringside seat at a singular moment in British life: the roller-coaster years of Tony Blair's New Labour had inaugurated a battle between the old world of aristocratic privilege and a new world of modern meritocracy. In A Field Guide to the British, Lyall strides her way readably, eloquently and perceptively across the social, political and cultural landscape of contemporary Britain. In a narrative studded with memorable anecdote and rich in humour, she explores themes as diverse as peers, politics, the media, understatement, the weather, and Britain's relationship with animals, alcohol and sex. She ponders such matters as the missing link between the famous British reserve and the famous British hooliganism (could it possibly be binge drinking?) ; how any parliamentary motion is ever passed when the Commons act like naughty schoolboys and the Lords spend two days debating UFOs; and the age-old question of how anyone could possibly enjoy a game as tedious as cricket...A Field Guide to the British is an impressively wide-ranging survey of contemporary British mores from a writer blessed with acute powers of observation and a fluent and readable writing style. Seeing ourselves through Lyall's eyes is sometimes embarrassing, often revelatory - but always very funny. Wry, insightful and engaging, A Field Guide to the British is permeated with a deep affection for its author's adopted country and an unerring eye for its oddities and eccentricities. It is required reading for Anglophiles and Anglophobes on both sides of the Atlantic.
Bemused visitors from the US will feel much better.. Sarah Lyall meditates wittily on class, circumlocution and non-cosmetic dentistry - Celia Brayfield in The Times. An affectionate portrait by an erudite outsider - Financial Times. ...very funny ... she is spot on, even devastating, about our sentimentality, about animals and the ugliness of British teeth ... a generous and understanding observer - Mail on Sunday.
A longtime reporter for the New York Times, Sarah Lyall has been a correspondent in the London bureau since 1995, writing news articles and features. She lives in London with her husband and their two daughters.
| SKU | Unavailable |
| ISBN 13 | 9781847245823 |
| ISBN 10 | 184724582X |
| Title | A Field Guide to the British |
| Author | Sarah Lyall |
| Condition | Unavailable |
| Binding Type | Hardback |
| Publisher | Quercus Publishing |
| Year published | 2008-10-02 |
| Number of pages | 288 |
| Cover note | Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary. |
| Note | Unavailable |