Youth is repeatedly referred to as "Arcadia," or heaven, in Brideshead Revisited. The novel is told as the recollection of a middle-aged man, so it may well be that a pair of rose-colored glasses is tainting the vision. Nevertheless, youth is presented in all the hazy splendor of a lovely, eternal dream. From lazy days drinking champagne to long strolls in gardens to narrator’s first, eye-opening introduction to a world of art and architecture, there’s little to dislike in this Arcadian paradise.
Charles and Sebastian’s friendship was dependent on youth and could not exist once they both became adults.