Smut

by Alan Bennett

Overview

One of England's finest and most loved writers explores the uncomfortable and tragicomic gap between people's public appearance and their private desires in two tender and surprising stories.

In The Greening of Mrs. Donaldson, a recently bereaved widow finds interesting ways to supplement her income by performing as a patient for medical students, and renting out her spare room. Quiet, middle-class, and middle-aged, Mrs. Donaldson will soon discover that she rather enjoys role-play at the hospital, and the irregular and startling entertainment provided by her tenants.

In The Shielding of Mrs. Forbes, a disappointed middle-aged mother dotes on her only son, Graham, who believes he must shield her from the truth. As Graham's double life becomes increasingly complicated, we realize how little he understands, not only of his own desires but also those of his mother.
A master storyteller dissects a very English form of secrecy with two stories of the unexpected in otherwise apparently ordinary lives.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781429951029
Publisher:	Picador
Publication date:	01/03/2012
Sold by:	Macmillan
Format:	eBook
Pages:	160
File size:	133 KB

About the Author

Alan Bennett has been one of England's leading dramatists since the success of Beyond the Fringe. The History Boys won six Tony Awards; his most recent play is The Habit of Art.

Alan Bennett has been one of England's leading dramatists since the success of Beyond the Fringe in the 1960s. His work includes the Talking Heads television series, and the stage plays Forty Years On, The Lady in the Van, A Question of Attribution, and The Madness of King George III. His play, The History Boys (now a major motion picture), won six Tony Awards, including best play, in 2006. In the same year his memoir, Untold Stories, was a number-one bestseller in the United Kingdom.

Reading Group Guide

About this Guide
The following author biography and list of questions about Smut are intended as resources to aid individual readers and book groups who would like to learn more about the author and this book. We hope that this guide will provide you a starting place for discussion, and suggest a variety of perspectives from which you might approach Smut.

About the Book
One of England's finest and most loved writers explores the uncomfortable and tragicomic gap between people's public appearance and their private desires in two tender and surprising stories.

In The Greening of Mrs. Donaldson, a recently bereaved widow finds interesting ways to supplement her income by performing as a patient for medical students, and renting out her spare room. Quiet, middle-class, and middle-aged, Mrs. Donaldson will soon discover that she rather enjoys role-play at the hospital, and the irregular and startling entertainment provided by her tenants.

In The Shielding of Mrs. Forbes, a disappointed middle-aged mother dotes on her only son, Graham, who believes he must shield her from the truth. As Graham's double life becomes increasingly complicated, we realize how little he understands, not only of his own desires but also those of his mother.

A master storyteller dissects a very English form of secrecy with two stories of the unexpected in otherwise apparently ordinary lives.
About the Author
Alan Bennett has been one of England's leading dramatists since the success of Beyond the Fringe. The History Boys (Faber, 2006) won six Tony Awards; his most recent play is The Habit of Art.

Editorial Reviews

In Smut, a devilishly charming pair of novellas, Alan Bennett introduces us to two fusty middle-aged women and sets them on a course for reinvention. But there's no mistaking his territory for Oprah's. Bennett…has something far more subversive—even obscene—in store. His matrons are not at all what they seem, and in pushing them toward revelation, he playfully shows us how misleading appearances can be.
—The Washington Post

Nora Krug

…slight but always enjoyable and often hilarious…[Bennett's] writing is as meticulous as ever.
—The New York Times

Benedict Nightingale

Artfully entertaining…On one particular subject Bennett is incomparably brilliant: role-playing, which is the meat of both stories.” —Simon Schama, Financial Times (London)

“Bennett's humor consistently resides in the logic of the parenthetical aside, the comedy of the false appearances or misperceptions being challenged or disabused.…Mrs. Donaldson is not as unconventional as she thought herself, and no one around Mr. Forbes is where—or who—they pretend to be.” —The Guardian (London)

“Tender and comic…This is Bennett's world, where repression is never far from the sexual act….Good, old-fashioned British humor with the lightest of subversive twists.” —The Independent (London)

From the Publisher

Two charming novellas by British playwright, actor, and author Bennett (The Uncommon Reader) make up this slender volume. In the first, "The Greening of Mrs. Donaldson," a respectable widow gets her daily dose of excitement by delivering Oscar-worthy performances to medical students, playing the roles of patients with a range of medical symptoms and conditions. This keeps her busy until her lodgers, a medical student and her boyfriend, behind on the rent, offer her payment in the form of a sexual performance, allowing her to be the voyeur. Hilarity and self-discovery ensue. In the second story, "The Shielding of Mrs. Forbes," another proper but less sympathetic matron is dismayed to learn that her good-looking son is about to marry a woman she considers too plain for him. Never mind that the fiancée is rich and brainy. And never mind that her narcissistic son is actually gay. Protecting Mrs. Forbes from that knowledge becomes the focus of everyone connected to her. Hilarity and subterfuge ensue. VERDICT As when Mr. Forbes gets turned on by murmuring naughty words like arse and fanny to his prudish wife, the smut here is of the tamest variety. Bennett's stories guarantee deliciously wicked fun. Recommended for all.—Barbara Love, Kingston Frontenac P.L., Ont.

Library Journal

Kinky hijinks rattle teacups among the British bourgeoisie in the latest from Bennett (The Uncommon Reader, 2008, etc.). The book consists of two stories, "The Greening of Mrs. Donaldson" and "The Shielding of Mrs. Forbes." While no more a hottie than Margaret Thatcher, widowed, cash-strapped 55-year-old Mrs. Donaldson rents out a bedroom in her home to a young couple. Her daughter's skeptical—"The first condom in the loo…and she'll soon change her tune"—but student lodgers Laura and Andy are presentable. This proves crucial, when, behind on rent, they present Mrs. D. with barter—a presentation of themselves, feckless, doing the deed. My heavens! Even more so, when she finds herself agreeing. But things have changed since hubby ("an unobjectionable man") departed, and Mrs. D. is spreading her wings. For one thing, she's taken a job at the hospital, enacting, for doctors-in-training, roles of ill patients, and when the part demands disrobing, she discovers a curious willingness. Soon she's hooked on the in-house freak show; when L. and A. depart, she mourns its loss. She gets on with life, though, perhaps a tad wiser…and warmer. In Bennett's next tale, Betty is smitten with fiancé Graham Forbes, dashing, doting and younger, but seems in no way wise to something awkward: He's gay (he spends the night before his nuptials with a boy named Gary). The Forbes folks initially pooh-pooh the match (they suspect she's Catholic!), but Graham, who'd married for money, in time startles himself by actually liking Betty: She's sharp, funny and understanding, and, with his sweetheart, the novelty even of hetero-sex is nice. Eventually, Graham's secret comes out—as do others ("Mr. Forbes still from time to time sleeps with his daughter-in-law and leads a vigorous fantasy life on the internet…"), but the Betty/Graham union continues satisfying. While the message in these bagatelles isn't clear, it probably has to do with acceptance. Odd and oddly charming.

Kirkus Reviews