SOURCE: “The Sweet Smell of Success,” in Spectator, April 11, 1998, pp. 33–4.

In the following review, Hensher argues that Fitzgerald’s The Blue Flower finally solidifies the author’s reputation.

A little national pride has been restored, in the aftermath of the much-lamented failure of any Briton to win anything much at the Oscars, by the triumph of a short English novel in gaining the most prestigious of American literary prizes. Penelope Fitzgerald’s ninth novel, The Blue Flower, beat the widely fancied chances of three enormous and ambitious American novels to walk off with the National Book Critics’ Circle Award. Well, the captains and the kings depart; prizes are more quickly forgotten even than the members of the Critics’ Circle; and what, in the end, will be left will be this great novel, a masterpiece.

Fitzgerald has been widely and justifiably praised for the excellence, discretion and solidity of...