One For The Books

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AUTHOR! AUTHOR! Alan Bennett

It's a wonder the modern world can find a place for Alan Bennett. In an age of braying, he whispers. In a pop culture consecrated to Don Juan, he seems the grayish professor — a wan don. His plays, for stage and TV, are subtle comedies about daft people ( The Madness of George III, The Lady in the Van ) or lost ones ( An Englishman Abroad, Talking Heads ). His method is understatement, indirection, irony. "In England, we never entirely mean what we say, do we?" a Bennett character declares in the 1977 play The Old Country. "Do I mean that? Not...

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