UNCLAY by T.F. Powys

With an Introduction by Professor John Gray*

Price £14.99

A paperback of 352 pages

ISBN-10: 0955152364 

ISBN-13: 9780955152368

 Dimensions: 210x140mm

In the remote Dorset village of East Chaldon, T.F. POWYS (1875-1953) wrote a steady succession of novels, novellas, fables and short stories which first appeared in print during the 1920’s and early 1930’s. These tales of startling originality and strange beauty offer wry observations on the human condition, the enigma of God, and arresting insights into the nature of good and evil, infused with subtle and dark humour of the rarest vintage.

In this, the author's final masterpiece, John Death arrives in the obscure Dorset village of Little Dodder with instructions to ‘unclay’ two of its inhabitants. Unfortunately for him, Death loses the divine chit bearing the names of the doomed pair, and is obliged to stay in Little Dodder until he finds it. And in the course of that summer he acquires a taste for life...

REVIEWS: ‘The last full-length novel of T. F. Powys, Unclay is the summation of his life’s work. Though not without precedents, the manner and the substance of this strange, compelling, not always comfortable book are uniquely his own … Theodore Powys is a religious writer without any vestige of orthodox belief, a dark poet who celebrates passing beauty and a stark realist who is also a supreme fabulist. Unless one unlocks these paradoxes one cannot fully understand his work, or appreciate the rare delights it contains.’

– From the Introduction by John Gray*

“In my view, Unclay is Powys's crowning achievement, since it contains the fullest artistic expression of his meditations on life, beauty, evil, love, and death.” - Marius Buning (author of T.F. Powys: A Modern Allegorist )

Bleaker, yet in some ways funnier than Powys’s better-known Mr Weston’s Good Wine, this is its equal as a masterpiece of economic, subtly allusive and evocative writing that owes much to the resonant simplicity and plain-speaking of the King James Bible.  – FireCrest Fiction 

To read a contemporary review of UNCLAY from The New York Times published March 6, 1932 please click here where a PDF file will open in a new window.

*JOHN GRAY is Emeritus Professor of European Thought at London University. He is the author of Straw Dogs: Thoughts on Humans and Other Animals (Granta), Al Qaeda and What It Means to Be Modern (Faber), Black Mass: Apocalyptic Religion and the Death of Utopia (Allen Lane/Penguin) and other books.

[bagg theatre in London is currently developing a new production of UNCLAY]

UNCLAY

T.F. Powys

Softback £14.99

 To Order: Click on the Google Checkout BUY NOW button to the left

 OR the PayPal button to the right

If you require further info please click here.

You can also PRINT OUT and post an ORDER FORM   

Should you have any queries please contact us here or by phone. 

All content ©Sundial Press 2008

We dispatch to the UK, Europe and Worldwide.

August 2008