'Viper wit from the gardener, writer and Knight of exquisite taste' DAILY TELEGRAPH
'Funny, barbed and moving ... magnificently readable' THE TIMES
Scenes and Apparitions covers a period of Roy Strong's life from 1988 to 2003. A sequel to Splendours and Miseries, it is an unmissable record of how a citizen at the close of the second Elizabethan age observed and chronicled his own world at the turn of the century. Although it is not without tragedy - the murder of his friend Gianni Versace, and the death of his beloved wife Julia Trevelyan Oman - there is plenty to enjoy from his descriptions of Elton John's fiftieth birthday party, to a concert for the Queen Mother, and his portraits of marriage, friendship, work and his celebrated garden, The Laskett.
Sir Roy Strong CH, historian, diarist and gardener, was Director of the National Portrait Gallery and the Victoria & Albert Museum. His previous two volumes of his diaries: SPLENDOURS AND MISERIES and SCENES AND APPARITIONS brilliantly cover the years 1967-2003. His acclaimed THE STORY OF BRITAIN was updated and reissued in 2018.