THE SPIDER'S HOUSE

by Paul Bowles ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 4, 1955

The many factions in Fez -- the French and their hated rule and maintenance of a false monarch on the throne; the pitiless Iztiqulal; the Islamic heritage of the true believers -- these are the background for the story of young Amar, who has the gift of the baraka, and the point at which his life touches on those of John Stenham, an American writer, and Lee Veyron, also American and restlessly seeking she knows not what. Amar has stayed incurious, in a deep freeze of isolation of his Koranic laws; he wakens slowly as crisis mounts and resistance strengthens; his meeting with Stenham and Lee takes him out of his quarters to theirs, and their prying into his feelings and opinions. When violence erupts, they flee with Amar on a pilgrimage to a local celebration and escape the city's violence; Lee ends her search; Amar is the means of helping a propagandist evade the police and comes back to Stenham and Lee, hoping to be taken to Meknes -- but they refuse. A complex canvas of ideological argumentation is highlighted with pictures of the feudal city of Fez, of Moslem preaching and practice, of a static world coming out of insularity, but it is hampered by a tortured prolongation of the mouthings of misfits. Followers of Bowles' work will find his international thinking has dimmed his sometimes brilliance of writing, to a point of near-fatigue.

Pub Date: Nov. 4, 1955

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Random House

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1955

Categories: FICTION