I cannot think of another writer whose judgments are quite so steely, so genuinely unimpressed by reputation. But then in anything Bennett takes on there is a self-confidence which is none the less formidable because it is concealed under this carapace of modesty. It will be done his way or not at all. His plays, for example, offer only minimal homage to the gross contrivances of the stage; they explore an idea — a mad king, an old- fashioned schoolmaster — in a discursive, dwelling style which doesn’t seem to be going anywhere much. According to the conventional preconceptions, this ought to be box-office poison, but never is. Talking Heads deliberately affronts the telly producer’s taboo — that the viewer cannot tolerate prolonged exposure to a single face and voice. The irony is that, although this concentration is just how the playlets make their remarkable effect, one does miss something and that something is Bennett’s own voice, those kindly, tired, gravelly tones, so thoughtful, so eternally self-critical, for it is that voice which redeems his characters from condescension and caricature.
Untold Stories, for its part, says boo to the notion that a serious writer’s anthology should be a ruthless culling of his best work. This is a Christmas allsorts, jam-packed with delights. Only the reminiscences of theatrical productions are for me as tedious as I always find such things, no matter what the play or the players. I would not cross the road to hear William Shakespeare himself telling the story of Twelfth Night’s first night. The rest of it — the rambles round art galleries and out-of-the-way mediaeval churches, the acerbic commentaries on modern life, the vivid recollections of the Leeds of his youth — is pure pleasure, a marvellous meander you dread to see the final bend of. Even so, I might be tempted to lift out ‘Untold Stories’ from Untold Stories and preserve it separately for the nation, because it is something else, a work of art, and without a drop of splother in it.
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