Book description
A scholarly, passionate and brilliantly-written biography of Pablo
Picasso by Patrick O'Brian, the famous author of the much-loved
Aubrey-Maturin series, reissued in a stunning new cover.
Patrick O'Brian's outstanding biography of Picasso explores
comprehensively the life of this awe-inspiring artist. Enormously
productive and hugely successful, Picasso continues to attract avid,
insatiable public interest. O'Brian was a close friend and a neighbour
of Picasso's, and the book reflects the closeness of their friendship
and the immense erudition and warm wit of Patrick O'Brian.
The man that emerges from the pages is full of contradictions: hard yet
tender, mean yet generous, affectionate but cold, professing communism
but retaining an essentially Catholic mentality, private despite his
relish of fame. Critically, O'Brian's is the only biography to fully
appreciate the distinctly Mediterranean origins of Picasso's character
and art.
Sex and money, eating and drinking, friends and quarrels, comedies and
tragedies, suicides and wars tumble over each other in the vast chaos of
Picasso's experience, He was 'a man almost as lonely as the sun, but one
who glowed with much the same fierce, burning life.' 'Patrick O'Brian
has written much the best biography of Picasso. It is full of
information, the judgements both of Picasso as a man and as an artist
seem to me remarkably convincing, and it is extremely well-written. In
particular, the relationship between Picasso and the Catalan painters is
given its true importance, both in his formative years and, as friends,
throughout his life.'
Kenneth Clarke Patrick O'Brian, until his death in 2000, was one of
our greatest contemporary novelists. He is the author of the acclaimed
Aubrey-Maturin tales and the biographer of Joseph Banks and Picasso. He
is the author of many other books including Testimonies, and his
Collected Short Stories. In 1995 he was the first recipient of the
Heywood Hill Prize for a lifetime's contribution to literature. In the
same year he was awarded the CBE. In 1997 he received an honorary
doctorate of letters from Trinity College, Dublin. He lived for many
years in South West France and he died in Dublin in January 2000.
