IT ALWAYS used to be assumed that Anthony Powell's saga, "A Dance to the Music of Time", was unfilmable. Channel 4's skilful adaptation, aired in Britain this autumn, has disposed of that myth. But by showing that the novel was filmable, the producers...

RAGTIME Piccadilly Theatre London To try to understand modern America, it is probably best to start not as Martin Scorsese did, with the New York Irish gangs of the 1860s, but with New York's melting pot of immigrants and entrepreneurs at...

Anyone wanting to give a general idea of Anthony Powell's novels will find himself talking pretty soon about an easily recognised prose style and a steady concern with the well-born, well-off and well-educated. As it happens, the writing changes sharply between the early books and [A Dance to the Music of Time (ADTTMOT)]; for that matter, there are changes within ADTTMOT. But a distinctive polish, restraint and wit do run through all, and touches of learning are fairly regular. As to class, a few boo...

[The first three volumes of To Keep the Ball Rolling confirm] what one has always suspected: that Powell's sensibility and that given to Nicholas Jenkins, the narrator of his twelve-volume novel, A Dance to the Music of Time, are virtually indistinguishable. This similarity becomes evident in looking at the attitude struck by either Powell or his character toward his own gaffes…. Look … at a sketch of Maurice Bowra in Infants of the Spring:

One evening, dining tête-&...

Like Nick Jenkins, the amiable narrator of his roman-fleuve, "A Dance to the Music of Time," Mr. Powell tends to be self-effacing and reserved when it comes to talking about himself. He eschews glimpses "into the person crater, with its scene of Hieronymus Bosch activities taking place in the depths," preferring the role of observer; like another famous narrator named Nick—Nick Carraway of "The Great Gatsby"—he remains a sympathetic but somewhat distan...