With
compassion, honesty, and impressive research, George
Woodcock presents Malcolm Lowry: the man and his
works. The portrait that emerges depicts a series of
complex and destructive relationships which lead to
an existential exploration of alienation, exile and
identity, and to what many critics regard as some of
the finest writing to come out of the twentieth
century.
This
compelling collection of essays provides considerable
insight into the challenge Lowry set for himself as
an artist and the agonies he endured as he wrestled
with the problems of integration in his work and in
his life. The first section of the book, The Works,
considers all of Lowry's fiction and the evolution of
his style as he struggled to find the form
appropriate to a new approach to reality. Critical
evaluations of the novels and analysis of various
aspects of his work--his interpretation of the Faust
archetype, the influence of the Cabbala--are
presented.
The
influences which shaped his world and gave form to
his work are considered in the second section, The
Man and the Sources. From Lowry's love of jazz and
the cinema, to the books he read, Woodcock follows
Lowry's life: a life marked by violent alcoholism,
two unstable marriages and stints in jails and mental
institutions as he drifted to and from London, Paris,
New York and Mexico. Lowry's direct experiences had a
profound affect on the structure and content of his
writing. The essays on these facets of the man,
together with his letters and poems, and the
recollections of personal friends, reveal a great
deal in an intensive way about the nature of Lowry's
creativity.
Contributors
include: Robert B. Heilman, Anthony R. Kilgallin,
George Woodcock, Geoffrey Durrant, David Benham,
Matthew Corrigan, Conrad Aiken, Hilda Thomas, Downif
Kirk, W.H. New, Perle Epstein, William McConnell, and
Maurice J. Carey.
Table of Contents
GEORGE WOODCOCK
(1912-1995)--award-winning poet, author, essayist and
widely known as a literary journalist and
historian--published more than 90 titles on history,
biography, philosophy, poetry and literary criticism.
224
pages, 6x9, bibliography, index
Paperback
$19.99
13 digit ISBN: 978-1-155164-302-1
10 digit ISBN: 1-55164-302-2
Hardcover
$48.99
13 digit ISBN: 978-1-155164-303-8
10 digit ISBN: 1-55164-303-0
Biography &
Autobiography
July
2007
