William Golding Journal Extract:
Birthday
By Faber Editor, 23 September 2022
To mark Faber’s reissues of William Golding’s novels, we are publishing extracts from his journal. Here, he marks an important birthday.
Excerpts from William Golding’s journal on and around his birthday in 1986.
Today is my seventy fifth birthday and instead of commiseration the world appears determined to make it congratulations all the way. Still it will be good to see the young ones.
Everyone was most kind. Happy birthday was sung. I blew out seventy five candles – several people gave presents – Stephen [Medcalf] actually came across with an Iliad published in fifteen thirty four! It is almost terrifying to contemplate it and parting with the book must have cost Stephen a noble anguish. I am most grateful to him. In fact everything was sweetness and light. The unguessable mix of people worked very well indeed. The young people were a splendid leaven.
*It was Faber that threw the party Golding refers to here.
Read more from William Golding’s Journals here.
