SOURCE: “It Was Sad When That Great Ship Went Down,” in Spectator, September 14, 1996, p. 35.

In the following review, Gardam offers positive assessment of Every Man for Himself.

Beryl Bainbridge's first novel in five years is a short, taut piece of historical fiction, an account of the classic tragedy of the sinking in 1912 of the ‘unsinkable’ Titanic on her maiden voyage to America.

Every novel, of course, unless it is pure fable or allegory, is a historical novel. There is no present moment. Describe a current fashion or event—the gold ring in the navel, the heart-disease of Mr Yeltsin—and at once it is in the past. We need the sense of history in fiction, the light catching the provincial tea-service of Maggie Tulliver's aunt, Anna Karenina's black velvet ballgown heavy with lace. When it comes to a story like the Titanic, however, researched, physical, homely detail is...