Nigel Anthony
1) Justine
Set in Alexandria, Egypt, in the years between World Wars I and II, Justine is the first installment in the distinguished Alexandria Quartet. Here Lawrence Durrell crafts an exquisite and...
There hadn't been anything like this kind of rain in living memory. The River Brede had burst its banks, and not a single house in the valley had escaped flooding. Even where Wexford lived, higher up in Kingsmarkham, the waters had nearly reached the mulberry tree in his once immaculate garden. The Subaqua Task Force could find no trace of Giles and Sophie Dade, let alone the woman who was keeping them company, Joanna Troy. But Mrs. Dade was still
...3) Mountolive
'Mountolive who had already found the open sesame of language ready to hand, suddenly began to feel himself really penetrating a foreign country...'
In Mountolive, the third volume in Durrell's Alexandria Quartet, the events surrounding the interwoven community of Nessim, Justine, Narouz, Pursewarden and the other major characters are given a very different perspective. The intrigues and complex relationships are seen through the political
...4) Clea
'I knew that Clea would share everything with me, withholding nothing—not even the look of complicity which women reserve only for their mirrors.'
In Clea, the concluding part of The Alexandria Quartet, Darley returns to Alexandria now caught by war-fever. The conflagration has its effect on his circle—on Nessim and Justine, Balthazar and Clea, Mountolive and Pombal—and a clarity of purpose emerges as the story moves
...5) Balthazar
'The politics of love, the intrigues of desire, good and evil, virtue and caprice, love and murder, moved obscurely in the dark corners of Alexandria's streets and squares, brothels and drawing-rooms—moved like a great congress of eels in the slime of plot and counter-plot.'
In Balthazar, the second volume in Durrell's Alexandria Quartet, the story and the characters come more clearly into focus. Darley, the reflective Englishman,
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