SILVERLOCK

by John Myers Myers ‧ RELEASE DATE: N/A

The author of The Wild Yazoo and The Harp and the Blade with an odd-and not too successful-bit of fantasy, a picaresque adventure tale in a never-never land, whose occupants might challenge the Quiz Kids' knowledge of literary figures. The allegory, having to do with Silverlock's compulsive, often tortuous search for life's meaning, bogs down in the extravagances of the imaginings, and the ponderousness of the style. The setting is a place called Commonwealth, where he finds himself shipwrecked and despondent, with barely conscious will- to-live. (Enough however to sustain him with his companion, on a piece of driftwood in the Atlantic!) From this point on, world literature is represented, as a voluptuous Circe turns him into a pig, there's a short stay with a Robin Hood crew, meetings with Beowulf, Alice-in-Wonderland, Don Quixote, Gawaine the Green Knight, Mephistopheles, Hamlet, Anna Karenina, Prometheus and Chaucer, to mention only a few. To come off successfully, this should sparkle with wit and approach its ends with subtlety. Actually, it is heavy footed and hard going.

Pub Date: N/A

ISBN: 0000155071

Page Count: -

Publisher: Dutton

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1949

Categories: FICTION