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Michael Moorcock is an award-winning author of more than 80 works of fiction and nonfiction, including The Cornelius Quartet, Doctor Who, and Elric: The Stealer of Souls. He has received the Nebula, World Fantasy, and British Science Fiction Awards and is a Grandmaster of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America. His nonfiction has appeared in Financial Times, the Guardian, and the Los Angeles Times. He lives in Bastrop, Texas. Alan Wall is a novelist, a short story writer, a
show more poet, an essayist, and a professor of writing anTags
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This is the fourth of four novels and bear in mind that I have not read the others - but it stands alone as one of the most remarkable attempts to get inside the mind of the idealistic European fascist. It contains one of the most disgusting sex-scenes in contemporary literature and there are occasional moments of obscure linguistic invention but if you get past the first ten pages, I think you are in for a treat and will find it hard to put down.
A basic knowledge of early twentieth century European history will help but it will teach more than it requires knowledge. Pyat is naive, the worst sort of idealist but only Moorcock can insidiously get away with making romantic fascism and national socialism come alive. A truly transgressive show more novelist even if the closing pages (no spoilers here) look like a necessary cop-out ... show less
A basic knowledge of early twentieth century European history will help but it will teach more than it requires knowledge. Pyat is naive, the worst sort of idealist but only Moorcock can insidiously get away with making romantic fascism and national socialism come alive. A truly transgressive show more novelist even if the closing pages (no spoilers here) look like a necessary cop-out ... show less
At last the finale novel in the 'Colonel Pyat' sequence has arrived after a long wait for Moorcock fans.
A deliberately over the top narrative arch involving real people from the early 20th Century collide with the semi-delusional recollections of the main character. The evils of Nazism and Fascism are brought vividly to life but also the sights and smells of the cities of Italy and Germany in the early 1930's. Wonderful fictional characters like the exuberant cockney singer and actress Mrs Cornelius (the mother of Jerry Cornelius, a famous Moorcockian protagonist) mix with Herman Goring, Ernst Rohm, Benito Mussolini and a disturbing cameo from Adolf Hitler himself.
But at the centre of course is 'Colonel Pyat,' probably the most show more unreliable narrator of them all. The ending of this four volume epic is particularly sad and poignant. show less
A deliberately over the top narrative arch involving real people from the early 20th Century collide with the semi-delusional recollections of the main character. The evils of Nazism and Fascism are brought vividly to life but also the sights and smells of the cities of Italy and Germany in the early 1930's. Wonderful fictional characters like the exuberant cockney singer and actress Mrs Cornelius (the mother of Jerry Cornelius, a famous Moorcockian protagonist) mix with Herman Goring, Ernst Rohm, Benito Mussolini and a disturbing cameo from Adolf Hitler himself.
But at the centre of course is 'Colonel Pyat,' probably the most show more unreliable narrator of them all. The ending of this four volume epic is particularly sad and poignant. show less
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659+ Works 65,119 Members
Michael Moorcock, 1939 - Writer Michael Moorcock was born December 18, 1939 in Mitcham, Surrey, England. Moorcock was the editor of the juvenile magazine Tarzan Adventures from 1956-58, an editor and writer for the Sexton Blake Library and for comic strips and children's annuals from 1959-61, an editor and pamphleteer for Liberal Party in 1962, show more and became editor and publisher for the science fiction magazine New Worlds in 1964. He has worked as a singer-guitarist, has worked with the rock bands Hawkwind and Blue Oyster Cult and is a member of the rock band Michael Moorcock and the Deep Fix. Moorcock's writing covers a wide range of science fiction and fantasy genres. "The Chronicles of Castle Brass" was a sword and sorcery novel, and "Breakfast in the Ruins: A Novel of Inhumanity" uses the character Karl Glogauer as a different person in different times. Karl participates in the political violence of the French Revolution, the Paris Commune, and a Nazi concentration camp. Moorcock also wrote books and stories that featured the character Jerry Cornelius, who had no consistent character or appearance. "The Condition of Muzak" completed the initial Jerry Cornelius tetralogy and won Guardian Literary Prize in 1977. "Byzantium Endures" and "The Laughter of Carthage" are two autobiographical novels of the Russian emigre Colonel Pyat and were the closest Moorcock came to conventional literary fiction. "Byzantium Endures" focuses on the first twenty years of Pyat's life and tells of his role in the Russian revolution. Pyat survives the revolution and the subsequent civil war by working first for one side and then another. "The Laughter of Carthage" covers Pyat's life from 1920-1924 telling of his escape from Communist Russia and his travels in Europe and America. It's a sweeping picture of the world during the 1920's because it takes the character from living in Constantinople to Hollywood. Moorcock returned to the New Wave style in "Blood: A Southern Fantasy" (1994) and combined mainstream fiction with fantasy in "The Brothel of Rosenstrasse," which is set in the imaginary city of Mirenburg. MoorCock won the 1967 Nebula Award for Behold the Man and the 1979 World Fantasy Award for his novel, Gloriana. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
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Common Knowledge
- Original publication date
- 2006
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- Members
- 140
- Popularity
- 230,399
- Reviews
- 2
- Rating
- (3.63)
- Languages
- English
- Media
- Paper, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 7
- ASINs
- 2
