Christopher Isherwood Inside Out

An engrossing new biography of the man whose writings about 1930s Berlin made him famous. From the editor of Isherwood's diaries and letters.

Christopher Isherwood Inside Out presents a captivating exploration of a man who rejected the life he was born to and set out to create his own path. As heir to an English estate, Isherwood flunked out of university, moved to Berlin, was driven through Europe by the Nazis, and journeyed around the globe before finally settling in Hollywood. In California, he adopted a new religion and continued forming friendships—many of which were romantic and sexual—with other celebrated artists, which led to profound self-discovery.

Isherwood frequently fictionalised his friends and himself, from the detached "Christopher Isherwood" of Goodbye to Berlin to George, the unapologetic middle-aged lover of men in A Single Man, and the boldly out narrator of Christopher and His Kind. He was determined to portray his milieu appealingly to mainstream audiences through lucid, entertaining, and often hilarious prose. His frankness about sexuality, political beliefs, and religion rendered him both a figurehead for the left and a target for the right. Meanwhile, his inmost self remained concealed amongst his many public, constructed personas.

Drawing on a wealth of unpublished material, Christopher Isherwood Inside Out unveils the drama and intricacy of Isherwood's internal world. It narrates how the traumas of his father's World War I death and his failure to protect his German lover from the Nazis were healed by his life as a monk in the 1940s. This healing journey enabled him to commit openly to a sexually liberated relationship in the 1950s and to emerge as a 'grand old man' of the gay rights movement in the 1970s.

With this comprehensive biography, enriched by unlimited access to Isherwood's partner Don Bachardy, Katherine Bucknell demonstrates how Christopher Isherwood achieved a uniquely inspiring personal existence. Both through his literary works and the way he lived, he effected lasting change in our culture.