["Winter Garden"] is razor sharp, most appealing and somewhat resembles a quicksilver Stravinsky-Balanchine ballet. An unusual combination of characters and events creates mystery and tension. Under the auspices of the Soviet Artists' Union, three English artists and the befuddled lover of one of them tour Russia on one of those cultural journeys meant to end war. The slightly shabby foursome are in disarray but determined to have an experience. Although Miss Bainbridge is typically English in her distance from her characters, she is not callous. She is a nonchalant comic whose dialogue is central to her success. Life and death, good and evil are not obtrusive themes in her work: obliquely, however, belief is. Against the leaden Russian sky, these English people form eerie figures, each making a small argument against artistic and spiritual monotony. Probably because Miss Bainbridge's manner is brief and remote she has mistakenly been considered minor. But in this graceful, disturbing thriller she has very major matters on her mind. (p. 9)
Miss Bainbridge takes special pleasure in human unpredictability. She shows that people are hardly ever what they appear—just put them in a new place, ask them a question, give them a choice and they will thwart expectations….
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