Bøger af Denton Welch

På et hotel i Surrey er den 15-årige Orvil Pym på sommerferie med sin far og sine to storebrødre, væk fra den forhadte kostskole. Den sky og sensitive Orvil savner sin afdøde mor og føler sig fremmed for både sin familie og deres påtrængende maskulinitet, for de jævnaldrende drenge på hotellet og for livet i det hele taget. For at undgå det frygtede samvær med andre går han på voyeuristisk opdagelse i det labyrintiske hotel, i de omkringliggende landskaber og i sine egne vildt associerende fantasier, hvor det frastødende og nydelsesfulde mødes.For Orvil er det ikke den ydre verden, der tæller; det gør idiosynkrasierne, interesserne og hans egne fikse idéer: Han smører sig ind i læbestift, han leger slave og fantaserer om en eremittilværelse. Han er optaget af antikviteter og nipsgenstande; af alt, der er ornamenteret og skrøbeligt og minder om fortiden; af grotter, forladte hytter og gamle kirker. Han er også optaget af dødsfantasier og erindringer om sin savnede mor. Og da en kano med en meget maskulin skolelærer kommer sejlende, optages han af også af ham.Ungdoms sødme er en roman fyldt med anspændt seksualitet og usikker kønsidentitet, med ensomhed og isolation. Det er den første bog af Welch, der er oversat til dansk. Vidt forskellige forfattere som E.M. Forster, William S. Burroughs og John Updike har beundret ham, mens Jack Kerouac harcelerede over, at det var Truman Capote og ikke Welch, der blev læst og var bredt anerkendt.Romanen er, ligesom Welchs øvrige udgivelser, primært selvbiografisk (han levede i en stadig frygt for sagsanlæg, fordi hans bøger lå så tæt på virkeligheden). Heri ligger måske en af grundene til, at Welch i eftertiden mest har været en forfatternes forfatter. For Welch skrev – i 1945 – temmelig åbent antydende om sin homoseksualitet og om Orvils spirende erkendelse af egen seksualitet, der viser sig med en blanding af fascination, voyeurisme og masochisme.

'Unlike any other person I had come across, Welch seemed to be speaking particularly to me' Alan Bennett'Vivid ... surprising ... an exquisite balance of pain and beauty' GuardianOrvil Pym does not fit in. A waifish, eccentric, sensitive fifteen-year-old, he hates school and longs to be alone. Spending his Summer holidays in a genteel Surrey hotel with his mysterious father and two brothers who don't understand him, he explores ancient churches, spies on a man rowing in the river and collects antiques, escaping into his own singular aesthetic world. First published in 1945, this is an unforgettable portrayal of a young man's sensuous coming-of-age.'A heightened, sensual journey ... it is Orvil's vibrant energy that allows this book to bubble ... beautifully odd ... spectacular' Independent

Introduced once as bright boy of British belles letters, there may be a dubious few to whom his emasculated exoticism, nasty naughtiness may appeal... Not us... This is a fictional sequel to his Maiden Voyage, with many of its elements in exaggerated form, as Denton Welch continues to cultivate the odd, the perverse, the physically distasteful, the emotionally insecure. Here is Orvil Pym, 15, anxious adolescent with a fastidious femininity, as he spends a summer with his father and virile elder brothers. His fetid fancies, fears, bad dreams, his pursuit of objects d'art, his explorations and awkwardnesses, - socially, sexually, and his impotence in a cruder world all combine to no story, but reveries expressed in unalluring metaphor... But no... (Kirkus Reviews)

In the last eight years of his life - and he died when he was only thirty-three - Denton Welch wrote three novels, umpteen short stories, hundreds of poems, and - between 1942 and 1948, a profoundly personal and moving journal that recorded his swift maturity into a writer of genius. Therein he wrote of his battle with ill-health, his life lived in claustrophobic rooms, and (in frank, erotic terms) his frustrated pursuit of the 'ideal friend.' And yet he encountered some of the foremost writers of his time - Edith Sitwell, Herbert Read, Harold Nicolson, Vita Sackville West - and recorded every aspect of life with a fresh and arresting sensitivity.

'After I had run away from school, no one knew what to do with me...'Born in Shanghai in 1915, son of a wealthy rubber merchant, Denton Welch was dispatched to an English boarding school after his mother's death.