A Time to Dance

by Melvyn Bragg

Book Overview

Set in England's Lake District, this novel tells the story of an obsessive love affair between a 54-year-old retired bank manager and a young woman of 18 who comes from a poor and boisterous Irish family.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0316105988
• ISBN13: 9780316105989
• Release Date: January 1991
• Publisher: Little Brown and Company
• Length: 220 Pages
• Weight: 0.90 lbs.

Customer Reviews

She hated Sherry

At first this book reminded me of Of Human Bondage (Signet Classics) or Lolita By Vladimir Nabokov, but he seems to have avoided the pit falls in this novel. It is more like star crossed lovers by the end: the older man and the brilliant young girl he loves. It has depth and full flowering of passion and experience. It is better written than the history by Melvyn Bragg that got me interested. It pretty much covers a lot of bases in the love affair area: Love, obsession, deception, romance, infidelity. It is certain;y one of the best novels I have read lately. It even has suggested reading: William Hazlitt's Liber Amortis.

Love me tender

This novel is in the form of a long letter from a 54-year-old man to his 18-year-old lover. At first it sounds like the man is more in love with love than with Bernadette, his lover. He is also married, not necessarily unhappily either, though his wife is ill and soon (conveniently for the plot) dies. But before that happens, Bernadette becomes pregnant,and the story deepens from that point on. He and Bernadette decide to see each other while his wife is ill, though he continues to care for his wife with much love and tenderness. Bernadette tells him she will wait for him, and she does. Some of this comes across as just a tad too pat and unmessy - too idealistic - but Bragg is an excellent writer, and it's impossible not to find this book interesting: he pulls you right into the story.

A STORY OF "LOVE IN WHISPERS"

This is a well-written, beautifully evocative story of an illicit, thinly veiled relationship between a retired bank manager and an 18-year old young woman in the North of England in the late 1980s. On the face of it, this story evokes reminders of Nabokov's "Lolita". Yet, as "A TIME TO DANCE" unfolds, the reader sees the blossoming of a relationship between a retired bank manager (who remains nameless) and Bernadette Kennedy, a young lady from a socially disadvantaged background who first comes to the attention of the retired bank manager through an essay she had submitted to a literary contest sponsored by the Rotary Club to which the aforesaid retired bank manager belonged. Impressed by the quality of Bernadette's essay, he helps carry the winning vote for her. It wasn't until a little later in the story that he meets Bernadette for the first time to congratulate her for winning the top prize, and by degrees, their relationship grows and deepens. Later in the story, complications develop in the relationship, which cause it to break up. While this is a story of a love between 2 people from different generations, it is also a very deeply affecting human drama. "A TIME TO DANCE" will leave the reader with nary a dry eye, seeing how it is that Love on a very personal level can broaden and enrich our everyday lives.