Lawrence Durrell (1912 - 1990)
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The Alexandria Quartet: Justine/Balthazar/Mountolive/Clea/Boxed Set (1957-1960) - Lawrence Durrell [Amazon.com] [FR] [DE] [UK]
Series of four novels by Lawrence Durrell. The lush and sensuous tetralogy, which consists of Justine (1957), Balthazar (1958), Mountolive (1958), and Clea (1960), is set in Alexandria, Egypt, during the 1940s. Three of the books are written in the first person, Mountolive in the third. The first three volumes describe, from different viewpoints, a series of events in Alexandria before World War II; the fourth carries the story forward into the war years. The events of the narrative are mostly seen through the eyes of one L.G. Darley, who observes the interactions of his lovers, friends, and acquaintances in Alexandria. In Justine, Darley attempts to recover from and understand his recently ended affair with Justine Hosnani. Reviewing various papers and examining his memories, he reads the events of his recent past in romantic terms. Balthazar, named for Darley's friend, a doctor and mystic, reinterprets Darley's views from a philosophical and intellectual point of view. The third novel is a straightforward narrative of events, and Clea, volume four, reveals Darley healing, maturing, and becoming capable of loving Clea Montis, a painter and the woman for whom he was destined. --The Merriam-Webster Encylopedia of Literature via Amazon.com
Biography
Lawrence Durrell (February 27, 1912 - November 7, 1990) was a British novelist, poet, dramatist, and travel writer. He was born in India and, at the age of eleven, was sent to attend school in England - a country in which he was never happy and which he left as soon as possible.
His first novel, Pied Piper of Lovers, was published in 1935. In that year Durrell, his wife, siblings and mother moved to the Greek island of Corfu where they lived until 1941, when they had to leave the island due to WWII. Lawrence Durrell separated from his wife in 1942, and became peripatetic, living for some time in Egypt, Rhodes, Argentina, and Greece, and finally settling in the south of France. He was married four times in all.
His most famous work was The Alexandria Quartet, a tetralogy. His brother, Gerald Durrell, was a major British naturalist and wildlife conservationist. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Durrell [Mar 2005]
The Alexandria Quartet: Justine/Balthazar/Mountolive/Clea/Boxed Set (1957-1960) - Lawrence Durrell
The Alexandria Quartet is a tetralogy of novels by British writer Lawrence Durrell, published between 1957 and 1960. A critical and commercial success, the books present four perspectives on a single set of events and characters in Alexandria, Egypt, before and during World War II.
The four novels are:
- Justine (1957)
- Balthazar (1958)
- Mountolive (1958)
- Clea (1960)