The Nightingale Papers

by David Nokes

In this darkly satirical fiction debut, a harmless joke thrown in after one glass of wine too many triggers a chain of vengeful plots, grotesque confrontations, and literary hoaxes. World experts on Madoc, the great 18th-century poet, are assembling for a celebratory conference in Wales; the setting is an isolated building run by a religious sect advocating purity of mind. It’s a gathering populated by shady, repressed, and unscrupulous academics, whose only means of salvation appears to be through the discovery of an unknown page from the works of a dead writer; but when a new canto from Madoc’s masterpiece appears out of the blue and is presented at the conference, the heat is on. The result can only be literary disaster. In tones reminiscent of Swift and Pope, this piercing black comedy adds a new page to the long British tradition of social satire. David Nokes won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for A Hypocrite Reversed.

160 pages, Hardcover

First published May 1, 2005

About the author

A scholar of 18th-century English literature, David Nokes, FRSL, was Professor of English Literature at King's College London. He attended King's College School, Wimbledon, London. He received an MA from Christ's College, Cambridge in 1972 and a Ph.D. in 1974.

Reviews

[Angela Gostling · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excruciatingly funny exploration of academia. Characters are well drawn and overall well structured and evoked. Enjoyed it enormously.