The Military Philosophers

Cecil Beaton, Daisy Fellows, 1941

By Anthony Powell, Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1995

This is the final book of AP's "war trilogy" and the ninth book in Dance to the Music of Time.  Its 1942, and Jenkins is working with Finn, assigned to the Poles in Allied Liaison, and Pennistone.  Jenkins visits Polish HQ which is housed in the Ufford Hotel.  His driver is Pamela Flitton, femme fatale and Stringham's niece.  Pamela informs Jenkins that Stringham was captured when Singapore fell.

One night during 1944 while living in Chelsea, Jenkins meets Pamela and her lover Odo Stevens during a bombing attack.  Mrs. Erdleigh makes prophecies about everyone's future while Odo and Pamela fight.

Jenkins makes a tour of Normandy and Belgium with a party of Allied military attaches.  While in Brussels Jenkins meets Bob Duport who tells him that Peter Templer died in the Balkans.  Stringham is assumed dead.

By the end of the war, Miss Weedon is engaged to Sunny Farbrother, and Widmerpool is due to marry Pamela.  At a party, Pamela accuses Widmerpool of intentionally putting Templar in harm's way.  There is a victory thanksgiving service at St. Paul's Cathedral, and Jenkins meets Jean (nee Templar) who is now married to Colonel Flores, a Latin American military attache.  Jenkins is released from the military and gets a new suit of clothing.  

Three novels left.  I am uninspired by AP to the point of feeling outright resistance.  I don't think its an accident that Kingsley Amis and Philip Larkin (gasp!) are fans.