Reviews for Bombay to Bloomsbury: A Biography of the Strachey Family

The average rating for Bombay to Bloomsbury: A Biography of the Strachey Family based on 2 reviews is 3 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2011-02-02 00:00:00 Mark Zappa I liked this book quite a bit. It was pretty readable, and this subject is certainly interesting. The Strachey family, in case you don't know, are part of the English imperialist tradition. The parents considered themselves Anglo-Indian, and some of the sons do follow the family tradition and work in India. It is a large family and many of them become accomplished and successful. Lytton, for one becomes a famous writer. Some of the siblings and their friends comprise the Bloomsbury group, which I know about from reading Virginia Woolfe. The book breaks up the history into chapters with titles such as: "Single life" and "A feminist Family", so some might fine it too simplified, but I felt it kept the pace interesting and saved it from being a boring list of who went where. True historical scholars might find it all to simple and predictable. You could also say you would not need to read the book because you could just read the chapter titles. But, while there is not a lot of detail to events, there is a good amount of drama, homosexual as well as heterosexual. There are pages and pages assessing their marriages and relationships, including their sex lives. In the end, it is about the end of the Victorian age and hello twentieth century, which I find interesting, and is clumping nicely with the book I'm reading about the grandsons of Queen Victoria. Also, coming from a large family, I could relate to the shifting alliances and historical stalagmites of ten siblings. I lent it to my mother, will see how she likes it.

Review # 2 was written on 2021-02-10 00:00:00 Eric Viney 3.5