Last Years
In 2003, Bainbridge's grandson Charlie Russell began filming a documentary, Beryl's Last Year, about her life. The documentary detailed her upbringing and her attempts to write a novel, Dear Brutus (which later became The Girl in the Polka Dot Dress); it was broadcast in the United Kingdom on 2 June 2007 on BBC Four.
In 2009, Beryl Bainbridge donated the short story Goodnight Children, Everywhere to Oxfam's Ox-Tales project, four collections of UK stories written by 38 authors. Her story was published in the 'Air' collection. Bainbridge was the patron of the People's Book Prize.
Bainbridge was still working on The Girl in the Polka Dot Dress at the time of her death. The novel, which was based on a real-life journey Bainbridge made across America in 1968, is about the mystery girl reputed to have been involved in the assassination of Robert Kennedy. The novel was edited for publication by Brendan King and published in May 2011 by Little, Brown.
Read more about this topic: Beryl Bainbridge
Famous quotes containing the word years:
“Porter: O.K., O.K., you win. I’ll marry you. How ‘bout it?
Lora May: Thanks. For nuthin’.
Porter: Now what kind of an answer is that?
Lora May: I don’t know. I just felt like it, that’s all.
Porter: We’ll do all right, kid. We’re startin’ out where it takes most marriages years to get.”
—Joseph L. Mankiewicz (1909–1993)
“Youth is rather to be pitied than envied by people in years since it is doomed to toil through the rugged road of life which the others have passed through, in search of happiness that is not to be met with in it and that, at the highest, can be compounded for only by the blessing of a contented mind.”
—Samuel Richardson (1689–1761)