Sergey Prokofiev: Diaries volume 3: review Unsurprisingly, there's a somewhat breathless air about these fascinating diaries. Prokofiev is constantly moving between rented houses, always on a train for the next concert date, bumping into famous people in restaurants. The surprising thing is how often this astonishingly productive man is laid low by headaches, heart murmurs and fainting fits. His new wife, a Spanish singer named Lina but whom Prokofiev calls "Ptashka," is even more prone to them. Time and again they turn up for a joint concert, only to find that Ptashka's voice has given out and Prokofiev is forced to play one of his sonatas "even though I've not practised it for months." He never fails to tell us how loud the applause was, on a scale from "disappointing" to "tremendous." But the malice is often counterbalanced by surprising surges of sympathy and affection. He has an odd mixture of shrewdness and a child's tendency to be bewitched by one striking feature of a scene. The results are often vivid but frustrating, as in his meeting with Maxim Gorky, another self-exiled Russian, ensconced for much of the Twenties in a villa near Naples. We hope to hear some of the great man's thoughts on art and politics, but all we discover is that Gorky is a heavy smoker and coughs continuously, "a short, dry cough, disagreeable and even frightening to hear like a dog barking." That image of a dog barking is the authentic Prokofiev touch; one could imagine a "barking Gorky" character in one of his ballets, pictured by an oddly sinister bassoon. Prokofiev's naivety emerges most strongly in his unquestioning belief in Christian Science, about which he constantly harangues his friends. He pays 20 francs for a consultation with a Christian Scientist doctor, who gives him a primer to read while she goes into a trance. Prokofiev is so impressed he tries to tip her 10 francs, but the following week is puzzled when he's afflicted with "a headache that shouldn't be happening." Editor Anthony Phillips has once again lavished endless care on the translation and the footnotes. These are full of fascinating information about the swarms of Russian émigrés in Paris, some of whom were unwise enough to return to the Soviet Union and ended up in prison or murdered, some of whom made good in America (such as the composer Vladimir Dukelsky, who as Vernon Duke became the well-known composer of April in Paris and Autumn in New York). Prokofiev was one of these insecure souls, and behind the parties and premieres one feels his increasing homesickness, exacerbated by frequent tours to Mother Russia. On a freezing morning in 1929 he crosses the border from Latvia to the USSR with Lina. The thought returned: this was positively our last chance before it would be too late to turn back. Yes it would have been humiliating, but if it had been a matter of life or death we could have accepted it. Given the sadness that lay in store for Prokofiev after his final return in 1933 - the official denunciation in 1948, and the cruel persecution of Lina, who ended up in a labour camp - that would have been a small price to pay. Sergey Prokofiev: Diaries vol 3 1924-1933 - Prodigal Son translated and annotated by Anthony Phillips 1152pp, Macmillan, t £26 (PLUS £1.35 p&p) Buy now from Telegraph Books (RRP £30)