Darkness visible

Name: Darkness visible
Author: Unknown Author
ISBN: 9780553147049

by Unknown Author

292 pages1981Bantam BooksISBN 9780553147049

Fiction Science Fiction

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About this book

This extraordinary new novel, by the author of the now classic Lord of the Flies, is William Golding's best novel in twelve years. In Darkness Visible he has written a story of our times, a chilling mystery which never ceases to mystify. The martyr of disturbing suggestion, William Golding stirs up the sediment of dark thoughts and half ideas within us all. Many "Septimius" Windrave/Windrove- his exact name is unknown 0 as a boy steps out of the flaming known - as a boy steps out of the flaming destruction of the London blitz miraculously alive, but orphaned and hideously scarred for life. Though Matty takes to wearing a black wide-brimmed hat to cover his disfigurement, he is set apart from others, he asks himself, " Am I only different from them in face?", his answer is "no." He becomes a prophet, a wandering soul, who has his own "voices". The journal he keeps - Is it madness or inspiration? Matty's genius is in the light of fire, " yet from those flames no light, rather darkness visible" appears. Darkness is also visible to many of the characters touched by Marty's life, all of whom drift in and out of Ruth and Sam Goodchild's bookstore near the center of town. Mr. Pedigree, a teacher in the boys' school which Matty attends, has pederasty as an obsession into his pathetic old age. Perhaps because Pedigree is at least capable of love, Marty wants (but does not get) his friendship capable of love (Matty wants but does not get) his friendship. The angelic looking twins, Sophie and Toni, admired for their charm and innocence, are loveless monsters. After a lonely childhood in which they are banished to rooms above the stables by a father who ignores them for a series of mistresses, both children grow up to be terrorists. Sophy, who begins her career by leaving a putrid duck egg in her father's night table, grows up into a full fledged gangster who masterminds a school kidnapping plot. Her sister, Toni, becomes a political terrorist. Matty's peregrinations crissc

Publication Details

Publisher: Bantam Books
Published: 1981
Pages: 292
ISBN: 9780553147049

About Unknown Author

The winner of the 1983 Nobel Prize in Literature, William Golding is among the most popular and influential British authors to have emerged in the second half of the twentieth century. Golding's reputation rests primarily upon his first novel, Lord of the Flies (1954), which is consistently regarded as an effective and disturbing portrayal of the fragility of civilization. **Childhood and college years** Golding was born in Saint Columb Minor in Cornwall, England, in 1911. His father, Alex, was a schoolmaster, while his mother, Mildred, was active in the Women's Suffrage Movement (the movement for women's right to vote). As a boy, his favorite authors included H. G. Wells (1866–1946), Jules Verne (1828–1905), and Edgar Rice Burroughs (1875–1950). Since the age of seven, Golding had been writing stories, and at the age of twelve he attempted to write a novel. Golding remained an enthusiastic writer and, upon entering Brasenose College of Oxford University, abandoned his plans to study science, preferring to read English literature. At twenty-two, a year before taking his degree in English, Golding saw his first literary work published—a poetry collection simply titled Poems. After graduating from Oxford in 1935, Golding continued the family tradition by becoming a schoolmaster in Salisbury, Wiltshire. His teaching career was interrupted in 1940, however, with the outbreak of World War II (1939–45). Lieutenant Golding served five years in the British Royal Navy and saw active duty in the North Atlantic, commanding a rocket launching craft. **Lord of the Flies** Golding had enhanced his knowledge of Greek history and mythology by reading while at sea, and when he returned to his post at Bishop Wordsworth's School in 1945, he began furthering his writing career. He wrote three novels, all of which went unpublished. But his frustration would not last long, when, in 1954, Golding created The Lord of the Flies. The novel was rejected by twenty-one publis