D.M.Thomas is only remembered now for The White Hotel. He's not always PC and I can't imagine a college course studying him even as far back as when I studied in the nineties. It's probably the frank sexual content that works against him. But I don't think he's a misogynistic writer. The main character here, Elena, is a true heroine, playing her part in upholding the place of art in a totalitarian state and acting as muse to poet's and painters to whom she provides compassion and love. One of the main characters is a woman poet too and inspired by Akhmatova and Tsvetaeva, so it's not as though women only play a subservient role. I would say though that Thomas rather piles on the degradation in describing the behaviour to which Elena is exposed in her time as a streetwalker.I was glad too that though Thomas is influenced by Freud, he or at least Elena as a character is not completely credulous in accepting the more outre conclusions of a psychologist character. The novel, though it has digressions on sex is principally concerned with surviving in repressive and precarious times and the role of poetry in upholding human values and love. Thomas writes beautifully and I flew through it. ( )