"Solid Ivory," by James Ivory

Oh, what fun it was to read James Ivory’s memoir, “Solid Ivory” (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2021)! James Ivory is the director of the famous Merchant Ivory films, working with his late producer and partner in business and in life, Ismail Merchant. The third of their film-making trio was the late Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, the screenwriter. Many of these films are based on novels by such authors as Henry James (e.g., "The Europeans," "The Bostonians") and E.M. Forster (e.g., "A Room with a View," "Howard's End"). They usually feature highly respected and acclaimed actors, beautiful scenery and costumes, and very high production values. The films are rich, luxurious, somewhat slow, literary but accessible, and pure joy for those of us who love the above-mentioned novels and who love literary films. This memoir is actually a series of memoiristic essays, some of them previously published in such venues as The New Yorker, about Ivory’s life and work, and about the famous people he knew. The book is informative, gossipy, and very frank about the author’s love and sex life. He has lived and worked in many different places in the United States, Europe, and in India, the latter a favorite locale. Photographs of the people and places in his life and work are generously sprinkled throughout the book. Although the Merchant Ivory Jhabvala style of films may be slightly out of fashion now, there are definitely descendants – similar if not quite up to the same standards -- to be found in some of today’s luxe period pieces on television, such as “The Crown,” “Sanditon,” and “The Gilded Age.”