Anita Brookner was a novelist and art historian. She won the 1984 Booker Prize for Hotel du Lac and was also the first woman to hold Cambridge’s Slade Professorship of Fine Art.
Anita Brookner
The Rules of Engagement
Viking, 2005.
The weather had deteriorated sharply...by the time I reached Baker Street Station my eyes were watering and my hair unkempt. The students, two Indians, two Japanese, and a Nigerian, seemed disenchanted, as I was, by the peculiar pall that hangs over a London Sunday...Our semi-rural surroundings failed to enchant. The students wanted, as I did, some sign of urban excitement, and this was sadly lacking. The green of the grass looked crude and cold; the very real cold made one yearn for a different climate, different colours. Before we were out of the park I made an excuse, designed to make my departure less offensive
Elizabeth has joined an advertised walk in Regent's Park organized by the warden of a Hall of Residence for foreign students, and for anyone else at a loss over the Christmas period.
I wanted more creature comforts than a walk in the park could provide, as did the students who stayed obstinately together, unappreciative of their surroundings. Mr. Ward, no fool, could see that this particular endeavour was proving a failure but had the good manners to give no sign of this, and went on talking pleasantly in a voice almost carried away by gusts of wind...The whole group watched as the taxi carried me away. I felt ashamed, as if I had let them down, but in fact they were merely envious. My action in leaving was, if anything, applauded