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Sebastian (Durrell Novel)
''Sebastian'', or ''Ruling Passions'' (1983), is the fourth volume in '' The Avignon Quintet'' series by British author Lawrence Durrell, which was published from 1974 to 1985. This novel is set mainly in Switzerland immediately after World War II. It continues the story of Constance and a Gnostic cult, which was introduced in the first novel of the quintet, ''Monsieur'' (1974). Plot summary A letter informs the Egyptian Sebastian Affad that he will die; a mix up has caused major ructions within the Gnostic sect in Egypt. Affad is called back to Egypt for admonishment. Before leaving Switzerland, however, he has asked Constance to use her psychiatric skills to treat his son, who has become autistic. She is gradually successful in working with the boy. After Affad returns to Switzerland from Egypt, the couple renew their relationship. The psychopath Mnemidis intervenes. After escaping from the institution where Constance works, he goes to her flat, intending to kill her, but mu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lawrence Durrell
Lawrence George Durrell (; 27 February 1912 – 7 November 1990) was an expatriate British novelist, poet, dramatist, and travel writer. He was the eldest brother of naturalist and writer Gerald Durrell. Born in India to British colonial parents, he was sent to England at the age of eleven for his education. He did not like formal education, but started writing poetry at age 15. His first book was published in 1935, when he was 23. In March 1935 he and his mother and younger siblings moved to the island of Corfu. Durrell spent many years thereafter living around the world. His most famous work is ''The Alexandria Quartet,'' published between 1957 and 1960. The best-known novel in the series is the first, '' Justine''. Beginning in 1974, Durrell published ''The Avignon Quintet,'' using many of the same techniques. The first of these novels, '' Monsieur, or the Prince of Darkness,'' won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize in 1974. The middle novel, '' Constance, or Solitary Prac ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Avignon Quintet
''The Avignon Quintet'' is a five-volume series of novels by British writer Lawrence Durrell, published between 1974 and 1985. The novels are metafictional. He uses developments in experimental fiction that followed his '' The Alexandria Quartet'' (1957-1960). The action of the novels is set before and during World War II, largely in France, Egypt, and Switzerland. The novels feature multiple and contradictory narrators, often with each purporting to have written the others as characters in a novel. The thematic materials range from a form of Gnosticism blended with Catharism, obsession with mortality, Fascism, Nazism, and World War II to Holy Grail romances, metafiction, Quantum Mechanics,. and sexual identity. The five novels are: :* '' Monsieur (novel), Monsieur'' (1974) :* ''Livia'' (1978) :* '' Constance'' (1982) :* ''Sebastian'' (1983) :* '' Quinx'' (1985) Durrell often referred to the work as a " quincunx." He described them as "roped together like climbers on a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Faber & Faber
Faber and Faber Limited, usually abbreviated to Faber, is an independent publishing house in London. Published authors and poets include T. S. Eliot (an early Faber editor and director), W. H. Auden, Margaret Storey, William Golding, Samuel Beckett, Philip Larkin, Ted Hughes, Seamus Heaney, Paul Muldoon, Milan Kundera, and Kazuo Ishiguro. Founded in 1929, in 2006 the company was named the KPMG Publisher of the Year. Faber and Faber Inc., formerly the American branch of the London company, was sold in 1998 to the Holtzbrinck company Farrar, Straus and Giroux (FSG). Faber and Faber ended the partnership with FSG in 2015 and began distributing its books directly in the United States. History Faber and Faber began as a firm in 1929, but originates in the Scientific Press, owned by Sir Maurice and Lady Gwyer. The Scientific Press derived much of its income from the weekly magazine ''The Nursing Mirror.'' The Gwyers' desire to expand into trade publishing led them to Geoffrey Fab ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Paperback
A paperback (softcover, softback) book is one with a thick paper or paperboard cover, and often held together with adhesive, glue rather than stitch (textile arts), stitches or Staple (fastener), staples. In contrast, hardcover (hardback) books are bound with cardboard covered with cloth, leather, paper, or plastic. Inexpensive books bound in paper have existed since at least the 19th century in such forms as pamphlets, yellow-backs, yellowbacks, dime novels, and airport novels. Modern paperbacks can be differentiated from one another by size. In the United States, there are "mass-market paperbacks" and larger, more durable "trade paperbacks". In the United Kingdom, there are A-format, B-format, and the largest C-format sizes. Paperback editions of books are issued when a publisher decides to release a book in a low-cost format. Lower-quality paper, glued (rather than stapled or sewn) bindings, and the lack of a hard cover may contribute to the lower cost of paperbacks. Paperb ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hardback
A hardcover, hard cover, or hardback (also known as hardbound, and sometimes as case-bound) book is one bound with rigid protective covers (typically of binder's board or heavy paperboard covered with buckram or other cloth, heavy paper, or occasionally leather). It has a flexible, sewn spine which allows the book to lie flat on a surface when opened. Modern hardcovers may have the pages glued onto the spine in much the same way as paperbacks. Following the ISBN sequence numbers, books of this type may be identified by the abbreviation Hbk. Hardcover books are often printed on acid-free paper, and they are much more durable than paperbacks, which have flexible, easily damaged paper covers. Hardcover books are marginally more costly to manufacture. Hardcovers are frequently protected by artistic dust jackets, but a "jacketless" alternative has increased in popularity: these "paper-over-board" or "jacketless" hardcover bindings forgo the dust jacket in favor of printing the cover ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Constance (novel)
''Constance,'' or ''Solitary Practices'' (1982) is the central volume of the five novels of Lawrence Durrell's ''The Avignon Quintet,'' published from 1974 to 1985. It was nominated for the Booker Prize in 1982. Involving some of the characters from the preceding ''Livia,'' the novel also introduces new ones. It is set before and during World War II, in France, Egypt, Poland and Switzerland. Plot summary The novel is set in the period from the outbreak of World War II in 1939 with the Nazi invasion of Poland, to the Allied invasion of Normandy in June 1944. Its settings include Avignon, France; Geneva, Switzerland; Poland, and Egypt. The first chapter continues in Avignon, where the previous novel, '' Livia'' (1979), was set. It details Constance's blossoming relationship with her husband Sam. As the clouds of war loom, a group of Europeans is breaking up whose last summer together was explored in ''Livia.'' Novelist Aubrey Blanford takes a post in Egypt, kindly offered to hi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Quinx (novel)
''Quinx,'' or ''The Ripper's Tale'' (1985), is the 5th and final volume in Lawrence Durrell's "quincunx" of novels, ''The Avignon Quintet,'' published from 1974 to 1985. It explores the activities of Constance, Aubrey Blanford, Robin Sutcliffe, Lord Galen, and most of the other surviving characters (including some who are theoretically fictional from Blanford's novel) as they return to Avignon and Provence in the immediate aftermath of World War II. Plot summary The surviving characters include "two novelists, a psychoanalyst, a German double agent, a Cambridge-educated gypsy, a Jewish lord, a schizophrenic young woman and an Egyptian prince."BARBARA FISHER WILIAMSON, "Links and Winks" ''New York Times,'' 15 September 1985; accessed 23 October 2016 The ex-Nazi double agent Smir ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Switzerland
). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel, St. Gallen a.o.). , coordinates = , largest_city = Zürich , official_languages = , englishmotto = "One for all, all for one" , religion_year = 2020 , religion_ref = , religion = , demonym = , german: Schweizer/Schweizerin, french: Suisse/Suissesse, it, svizzero/svizzera or , rm, Svizzer/Svizra , government_type = Federalism, Federal assembly-independent Directorial system, directorial republic with elements of a direct democracy , leader_title1 = Federal Council (Switzerland), Federal Council , leader_name1 = , leader_title2 = , leader_name2 = Walter Thurnherr , legislature = Fe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis powers. World War II was a total war that directly involved more than 100 million personnel from more than 30 countries. The major participants in the war threw their entire economic, industrial, and scientific capabilities behind the war effort, blurring the distinction between civilian and military resources. Aircraft played a major role in the conflict, enabling the strategic bombing of population centres and deploying the only two nuclear weapons ever used in war. World War II was by far the deadliest conflict in human history; it resulted in 70 to 85 million fatalities, mostly among civilians. Tens of millions died due to genocides (including the Holocaust), starvation, ma ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Monsieur (novel)
''Monsieur, or The Prince of Darkness'' (1974), is the first volume in Lawrence Durrell's ''The Avignon Quintet.'' Published from 1974 to 1985, this sequence of five interrelated novels explore the lives of a group of Europeans before, during, and after World War II. Durrell uses many of the experimental techniques of metafiction that he had integrated into his ''Alexandria Quartet,'' published 1957 to 1960. He described the later quintet as a quincunx. ''Monsieur'' is based on a metafictional narrative in five major sections, each with a competing narrator. The novel does not resolve which narrative is 'real' and which are 'fiction.' The novel was awarded the James Tait Black Memorial Prize in 1974. Background The novel draws extensively on Gnosticism, and this system of belief recurs as a plot element throughout the ''Quintet.'' Durrell had an interest in Gnosticism from the early 1940s and had studied Gnostic texts. According to critics James Gifford and Stephen Osadetz, f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Autistic
The autism spectrum, often referred to as just autism or in the context of a professional diagnosis autism spectrum disorder (ASD) or autism spectrum condition (ASC), is a neurodevelopmental condition (or conditions) characterized by difficulties in social interaction, verbal and nonverbal communication, and the presence of repetitive behavior and restricted interests. Other common signs include unusual responses to sensory stimuli. Autism is generally understood as a ''spectrum disorder'', which means that it can manifest differently in each person: any given autistic individual is likely to show some, but not all, of the characteristics associated with it, and the person may exhibit them to varying degrees. Some autistic people remain nonspeaking over the course of their lifespan, while others have relatively unimpaired spoken language. There is large variation in the level of support people require, and the same person may present differently at varying times. Historically, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
London Review Of Books
The ''London Review of Books'' (''LRB'') is a British literary magazine published twice monthly that features articles and essays on fiction and non-fiction subjects, which are usually structured as book reviews. History The ''London Review of Books'' was founded in 1979, when publication of ''The Times Literary Supplement'' was suspended during the year-long lock-out at ''The Times''. Its founding editors were Karl Miller, then professor of English at University College London; Mary-Kay Wilmers, formerly an editor at ''The Times Literary Supplement''; and Susannah Clapp, a former editor at Jonathan Cape. For its first six months, it appeared as an insert in ''The New York Review of Books''. It became an independent publication in May 1980. Its political stance has been described by Alan Bennett, a prominent contributor, as "consistently radical". Unlike ''The Times Literary Supplement'' (TLS), the majority of the articles the ''LRB'' publishes (usually fifteen per issue) are ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
