Towards the End of the Morning
Michael Frayn's much-loved novel plants itself firmly in one of Fleet Street's more forgotten corners, the crossword and nature notes desk of a minor national paper, during the slow twilight of that whole ink-stained era. At its centre sits John Dyson, a middling editor who nurses quiet fantasies of fame and a life of comfortable distinction. Then, quite unexpectedly, an opportunity drops into his lap. The question is whether he's actually got the nerve, the talent, or the sheer luck to make anything of it when television comes calling. Sharp, funny, and quietly devastating in its observations about human self-delusion, this is a comedy that knows exactly where to press. Frayn writes with a dry precision that makes each small humiliation feel both painful and irresistibly familiar. It's a book about the gap between who we imagine ourselves to be and who we actually are, and it finds that gap absolutely riotous.
- Author: Michael Frayn
- Publisher: Faber & Faber
- Genre: Journalism & Media Studies
- ISBN: 978-0571329892
- Pages: 244 pages