Mr. Samgrass Rides Again, Or the Warden's Regress (Maurice Bowra: A Life) (Book Review‪)‬

Maurice Bowra: A Life, by Leslie Mitchell. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009. 385 pp. $50.00. Although Maurice Bowra has been dead for nearly forty years and most of his books are out of print, he has never been out of sight as a result of many writings mentioning him. Continuing interest in Bowra is not due to his written work or his many years as de facto leader of Oxford University; it is, instead, due to the influence he had on many leading members of a remarkable generation of English writers, scholars and politicians who came within his orbit. The writers included Evelyn Waugh, Anthony Powell, John Betjeman, Cyril Connolly, and Henry Green; other luminaries were Hugh Gaitskell, Kenneth Clark, Roy Harrod, Isaiah Berlin, and John Sparrow.