What do you want in a book anyway?
Do you want to find bits of insight? perspective? unfashionably a fact or two?
Well, here you are.
This is a work of memory and deep introspection from a writer and a silent wife. Working on this compilation of writing must have been a difficult and painful task for Mrs. Morehead as well as whatever Mr. Morehead may have been able to perceive. It is right here for us to pick up and share.
Growing as he certainly did as a young man from Australia through The Spanish Civil War, WWII and post-war Europe, forced a late education. His writings in this remarkable memoir have both vivid recollections of the drama of being a foreign correspondent but his internal thoughts on the experience. These include the building of a life friendship through adversity, time spent with the likes of Bernard Berenson and a reflective Ernest Hemingway.
The writing just keeps getting better and then stops with the death of a friend and forever from a stroke. Will we have the likes of writings at this level again from the dwindling roles of journalists?
I read this work in a quite special hardcover numbered edition. #1468 of the 2,000 published. I trust that all 2,000 copies will be shared and treasured. ( )

This is an unusual but captivating, episodic autobiography of an Australian journalist in the 1930's to early 1950's.
The style is beautifully clear and makes for an engaging, easy and thought provoking read.
The events covered are both commonplace for their time (an Australian coming to England and Europe) and momentous (the Second World War African campaign, although these parts are about how Alan Moorehead found it, rather than the conflict itself, as he has written three books on that).
It is a book about a journalist/writer's life. It is a book about friendship, especially that with fellow war correspondent, Alex Clifford, as they covered the Second World War African campaign together and remained friends until Alex's early death in 1952, with which the book ends.
The book also includes brief portraits of Alan Moorehead's acquaintance with Ernest Hemingway and Bernard Berenson (I had to look up who this art historian was).
The core of the book is Alan Moorehead's friendship with Alex Clifford. It is the honesty and clarity of this friendship which makes this book very special. All the more so when you realise that the book was edited together by his wife, from autobiographical essays, after Alan Moorehead suffered a stroke in 1966.

I read the Slightly Foxed edition, which is a beautifully produced little hardback (and as in a limited edition of 2,000, you should get hold of it if you can). ( )

From the first book of Moorehead's, that I read, Gallipolli, I became a fan of his style, detail, and insight. After the first chapter, the narrative unfolds as a modest telling about Moorehead himself, his main focus is on his closest friend and colleague, and their many years together, their warm relationship, and an unfinished life.

One questions why Moorehead did not talk more about his wife, considering their long marriage. That is until you read the notes accompanying the book, and that is where the true tragedy unfolds. Moorehead was never able to finish his biography, his wife had to complete it for him. For a mind so active and aware, a stroke left him paralyzed for the last 20 years of his life, including watching his beloved wife die without being able to do anything about it.

Moorehead's work garnered my respect, but his humanity put him in a class of his own. After reading this book, I could not revel in the former without thinking of the latter. ( )

3 and a half stars. Review to come. ( )