Kenneth Widmerpool

I think it's important to emphasize that of all of Powell's friendships, I do find his friendship with Moreland to be some of the most lovingly rendered, you get the sense that, especially compared to his childhood friends who Nick often felt, you know, he befriended these childhood friends when he was still developing himself as a person.

Stringham, Templer, Widmerpool, they're, of course, going to be important, right? The novel series really, as we see, will center on those characters.

Stringham, of course, makes an appearance in this novel.

But as an adult, Morland seems to be the most significant friendship that Nick has as an adult.

We have had, of course, previous novels focus on individual characters, but never to this extent and never with this much seriousness and devotion.

So I think it sort of raises Moreland in our estimation as well, because we can see how important he is as a character to Nick.

Part of this is, of course, also Moreland's romantic temperament, which lends this particular novel a very heightened a very heightened quality, compared to, say, the previous novel in which, you know, Widmerpool and Quiggan were looked at slightly more derisively by Nick, or at least critically, we could say, if derisively might be too strong a word.

So we have these images at the beginning to set up the idea of ruin, the idea of fantasy, the idea of romantic longing for this past.