Any Human Heart

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Any Human Heart: The Intimate Journals of Logan Mountstuart is a 2002 novel by William Boyd, a British writer. It is written as a lifelong series of journals kept by the fictional character Mountstuart, a writer whose life (1906–1991) spanned the defining episodes of the 20th century, crossed several continents and included a convoluted sequence of relationships and literary endeavours. Boyd uses the diary form to explore how public events impinge on individual consciousness, so that Mountstuart's journal alludes almost casually to the war, the death of a prime minister, or the abdication of the king. Boyd plays ironically on the theme of literary celebrity, introducing his protagonist to several real writers who are included as characters. The journal style of the novel, with its gaps, false starts and contradictions, reinforces the theme of the changing self in the novel. Many plot points simply fade away. The novel received mixed reviews from critics on publication, but has sold well and has become one of the best known of Boyd's works. It is the second of Boyd's 'whole-life' novels which follow a protagonist through all, or at least most, of his or her life interspersing real and imagined events and people. Other such novels include The New Confessions (1987), Sweet Caress (2015) and The Romantic (2022). A television adaptation was made with the screenplay written by Boyd, first broadcast in 2010.