商品簡介
1919: After surviving the Great War, Major Brendan Archer makes his way to Ireland, hoping to discover whether he is indeed betrothed to Angela Spencer, whose Anglo-Irish family owns the once aptly-named Majestic Hotel in Kilnalough. But his fiancee is strangely altered and her family's fortunes have suffered a spectacular decline. The hotel's hundreds of rooms are disintegrating on a grand scale; its few remaining guests thrive on rumors and games of whist; herds of cats have taken over the Imperial Bar and the upper stories; bamboo shoots threaten the foundations; and piglets frolic in the squash court. Meanwhile, the Major is captivated by the beautiful and bitter Sarah Devlin. As housekeeping disasters force him from room to room, outside the order of the British Empire also totters; there is unrest in the East, and in Ireland itself the mounting violence of "the troubles."
作者簡介
J.G.Farrell (1935–1979) was born with a caul, long considered a sign of good fortune. Academically and athletically gifted, Farrell grew up in England and Ireland. In 1956, during his first term at Oxford, he suffered what seemed a minor injury on the rugby pitch. Within days, however, he was diagnosed with polio, which nearly killed him and left him permanently weakened. Farrell’s early novels, which include?The Lung?and?A Girl in the Head,have been overshadowed by his Empire Trilogy—Troubles, the Booker Prize–winning?Siege of Krishnapur,?and?The Singapore Grip?(all three are published by?NYRB?Classics). In early 1979, Farrell bought a farmhouse in Bantry Bay on the Irish coast. “I’ve been trying to write,” he admitted, “but there are so many competing interests–?the prime one at the moment is fishing off the rocks… . Then a colony of bees has come to live above my back door and I’m thinking of turning them into my feudal retainers.” On August 11, Farrell was hit by a wave while fishing and was washed out to sea. His body was found a month later. A biography of?J.G.?Farrell, J.G. Farrell: The Making of a Writerby Lavinia Greacen, was published by Bloomsbury in?1999.
John Banville was born in Wexford, Ireland, in 1945. He is the author of many novels, including?The Book of Evidence,?The Untouchable, and?Eclipse. Banville’s novel?The Sea?was awarded the 2005 Man Booker Prize. On occasion he writes under the pen name Benjamin Black.