Cardus: Celebrant of Beauty
A memoir by Robin DanielsNeville Cardus was born in Rusholme, Manchester, in 1888. He was the first music critic to be knighted, the most evocative – and most often quoted – writer on cricket of all time, and one of the great English essayists of the 20th century. It is hard to believe that so majestic and cultured a writer left school at the age of 13.
For more than half a century, he wrote about music and cricket for the Manchester Guardian. His first senior editor was the legendary C P Scott. His first literary editor – also mentor – was C E Montague, a distinguished writer and drama critic.
Cardus wrote 21 books: 10 about cricket, 8 about music, and 3 volumes of autobiography.
Cardus was a friend of cricketers (Don Bradman and Keith Miller), writers (J M Barrie and J B Priestley), actresses (Flora Robson and Wendy Hillier), and musicians (Beecham, Barbirolli, Menuhin, Arrau, Schnabel, Ferrier and Lotte Lehmann).
Although he spent the last years of his life in London, he retained his love of Lancashire. He was honoured by the Hallé Orchestra, and served as president of Lancashire County Cricket Club.
This memoir
Being fellow-Lancastrians was the first of many points of contact between Sir Neville Cardus and Robin Daniels. They shared a passion for music, conversation, and Lancashire cricket.
Thirty years later after Conversations with Cardus (one of the Sunday Times’s best books of the year) Robin Daniels has written a memoir of his friend and mentor. Here is a book of charm and insight, combining personal memories, biography, a fine selection of Cardus maxims and extracts, and an appraisal of the man, the friend and the writer.
This memoir of Cardus is enriched by a quartet of enthusiastic introductions written by Andrew Flintoff, Daniel Barenboim, Sir Colin Davis and Dennis Silk – cricketer, former Warden of Radley, and a friend of Siegfried Sassoon.
Cardus: Celebrant of Beauty will be of enduring appeal to lovers of music and cricket, and anyone who cherishes the art of fine English prose.