Hunted by an American academic who wants to be given access to his papers as his official biographer, best-selling author Wilfred Barclay - aware of secrets in his past which he very much does NOT want to be unearthed - flees across Europe from one hotel bar to another in an alcoholic delirium.
It was quite funny for a while but, like Wilf, the alcoholism seemed to destroy its structure. In the end I was disappointed. I found it slightly tedious. Perhaps there are too many books about old, curmudgeonly, drink-sodden novelists. It was written after he was awarded the Nobel Prize. It has a neat ending.
Selected quotes:
- “I had the loaded gun in one hand, my torch in the other and no third hand for my trousers which now fell suddenly under my dressing-gown so that I only just caught them by clapping my knees together. It was, perhaps, no situation from which to face the charging badger.” (Ch 1)
- “The question to be asked when reading one book is, what other books does it come from?” (Ch 2)
- “My ageing heart missed a beat and syncopated a few others.” (Ch 3)
- “Marvelous views don't get writers or painters going. they just give them excuse for doing nothing. ... What a writer needs is a brick wall.” (Ch 3)
- “I could see a file of Austrian, German, Swiss walkers going the other way, that is, back to the rack railway ... giving an impression of a set of figures going to be put back in their box.” (Ch 7)
December 2025; 191 pages
First published by Faber & Faber in 1984
My paperback edition issued in 1985
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