First published in 1947, Lowry's masterpiece has been compared to
Jacobean tragedy, Melville's Moby Dick, Conrad's Nostromo, Joyce
Cary and James Joyce. Now issued with a new introduction by poet
and publisher Michael Schmidt, this highly original novel is set in
and around Cuernavaca, a town in the mountains near Mexico City, on
the Day of the Dead, 1938. It is told entirely in flashback, after
an opening chapter set on the same day in 1939, a simple device
which has given the novel an unnecessary reputation for difficulty.
It is in fact often very funny, and at times deeply romantic, as
Lowry charts the decline and tragic death of the British Consul,
Geoffrey Firmin, an alcoholic of gargantuan proportions. His
younger brother Hugh, recently returned from fighting in Spain, is
visiting, as is Firmin's estranged wife, Hollywood starlet, Yvonne.
On one level, there is a touching story of doomed love, with
sinister undertones of espionage, while on another, Lowry's use of
symbolism and poetically heightened prose make the Consul and his
fate echo that of Europe, poised to tumble into the abyss of World
War II. (Kirkus UK)
It is the fiesta Day of Death in Mexico and Geoffrey Firmin - ex-consul, ex-husband, an alcoholic and a ruined man - is living out the last day of his life.
Drowning himself in mescal while his former wife and half-brother look on, powerless to help him, the consul has become an enduring tragic figure. His story, the image of one man's agonized journey towards Calvary, became a prophetic book for a whole generation.
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