LOS ANGELES: HOLLYWOOD AND BEYOND

Waugh, Evelyn. The loved one: an Anglo-American tragedy, London : Methuen, 1979.

In this short novel the master English satirist Evelyn Waugh turns his gaze on Los Angeles, the studio system and the funeral industry.  As an outsider, he had explored these subjects in a visit to Hollywood made shortly after WW2. Waugh subsequently became fascinated by Forest Lawn cemetery and its bizarre practices; the attitude towards death in general, in a city he viewed as practically a pagan place. 

The satire is mostly directed at the excesses of Whispering Glades (a fictional Forest Lawn), the euphemistic protocols, and philosophy of that institution, where death is given the “Hollywood” treatment.  As a Catholic writer, Waugh sublimates his sense of outrage at the degradation of the body (and presumably, soul) into mild but annihilating humour.

There is a sense that at 128 pages, The Loved One, is a minor work from this author, and while it was well received in 1951, the satire may seem somewhat tame by the standards of today.  The novel was published with a Preface by the author, the entire work having appeared in a single issue of the English literary magazine, Horizon.  The novel had a further incarnation when it was filmed, to a lukewarm critical reception, in 1965.

VIDEO: Excerpt from The Love One (1965)