|
|
Article: Grounded look at a soaring talent; Lawrence Durrell: A Biography. By Ian S MacNiven (Faber: pounds 25.00). Reviewed by Christine Barker.
- Article from:
- The Birmingham Post (England)
- Article date:
- April 18, 1998
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1998 Birmingham Post & Mail Ltd. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
|
A comet is always at its luminous best seen against a dark sky. And the skies of Europe were filled with gathering war clouds when the literary phenomenon called Lawrence Durrell appeared on the horizon.
He shot across the imagination of the reading public at a time when the dead of one catastrophic war were still being mourned even while the gun fodder for the next were being prepared for their ordeal.
A time, when as Shakespeare put it in Henry V: "Now all the youth of England are on fire, And silken dalliance in the wardrobe lies.."
Certainly ...