L.P. Hartley's moving exploration of a young boy's loss of innocence The Go-Between is edited
with an introduction and notes by Douglas Brooks-Davies in Penguin Modern Classics.'The past is
a foreign country: they do things differently there'When one long hot summer young Leo is
staying with a school-friend at Brandham Hall he begins to act as a messenger between Ted the
farmer and Marian the beautiful young woman up at the hall. He becomes drawn deeper and
deeper into their dangerous game of deceit and desire until his role brings him to a shocking
and premature revelation. The haunting story of a young boy's awakening into the secrets of the
adult world The Go-Between is also an unforgettable evocation of the boundaries of Edwardian
society.Leslie Poles Hartley (1895-1972) was born in Whittlesey Cambridgeshire and educated
at Harrow and Balliol College Oxford. For more than thirty years from 1923 he was an
indefatigable fiction reviewer for periodicals including the Spectator and Saturday Review. His
first book Night Fears (1924) was a collection of short stories but it was not until the
publication of Eustace and Hilda (1947) which won the James Tait Black prize that Hartley
gained widespread recognition as an author. His other novels include The Go-Between (1953)
which was adapted into an internationally-successful film starring Julie Christie and Alan
Bates and The Hireling (1957) the film version of which won the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film
Festival.If you enjoyed The Go-Between you might like Barry Hines's A Kestrel for a Knave
also available in Penguin Modern Classics.'Magical and disturbing'Independent'On a first
reading it is a beautifully wrought description of a small boy's loss of innocence long ago.
But visited a second time the knowledge of approaching unavoidable tragedy makes it far more
poignant and painful'Express
