Brideshead Revisited is Evelyn Waugh's stunning novel of duty and desire set amongst the decadent, faded glory of the English aristocracy, preceding the Second World War. The most nostalgic and reflective of Evelyn Waugh's novels, Brideshead Revisited looks back to the golden age before the Second World War. It tells the story of Charles Ryder's infatuation with the Marchmains and the rapidly disappearing world of privilege they inhabit. First enchanted by Sebastian Flyte at Oxford, then by his doomed Catholic family, in particular his remote sister, Julia, Charles finally comes to recognise his spiritual and social distance from them.