Those Barren Leaves
by Aldous Huxley
Huxley spares no one in his ironic, poignant depiction of the group gathered at the Italian court by the socially ambitious and self-proclaimed art-loving Mrs. Oldwinkle. Here, Mrs. Oldwinkle tries to regain the glory of the Italian Renaissance, but her guests are ultimately unable to live up to their naïve expectations. Among his circle: the reluctant editor of the Rabbit Fantasies Newspaper and the troubled poet, who quietly carried the desperate achievements of the widowed Mrs. Oldwinkle; a popular novelist who wrote every detail of his novel with another guest, lover Kalami, for future literary endeavors; and an aging sensual philosopher chasing after a rich but mentally handicapped heir. By depriving housewives of their claims, Huxley reveals the superficiality of the cultural elite. A delicious satire, "Those Wasteworks Leaves" bites the hands of those who dare to take a sophisticated stance or imitate it, and today it's as comically fresh as it was when it was first published.
