Clea

The Alexandria Quartet #4

by Lawrence Durrell

His affair with Clea, am agnetic, bisexual artist, not only changes the lovers, but transforms the dead, forever - and heralds a new beginning, just as Lawrence Durrell's intoxicating masterpiece ends.

Genres: Fiction, Classics, Historical Fiction, Literature, Egypt, Novels, Literary Fiction

368 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1960

About the author

Lawrence George Durrell was a critically hailed and beloved novelist, poet, humorist, and travel writer best known for The Alexandria Quartet novels, which were ranked by the Modern Library as among the greatest works of English literature in the twentieth century. A passionate and dedicated writer from an early age, Durrell’s prolific career also included the groundbreaking Avignon Quintet, whose first novel, Monsieur (1974), won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize, and whose third novel, Constance (1982), was nominated for the Booker Prize. He also penned the celebrated travel memoir Bitter Lemons of Cyprus (1957), which won the Duff Cooper Prize. Durrell corresponded with author Henry Miller for forty-five years, and Miller influenced much of his early work, including a provocative and controversial novel, The Black Book (1938). Durrell died in France in 1990.

The time Lawrence spent with his family, mother Louisa, siblings Leslie, Margaret Durrell, and Gerald Durrell, on the island of Corfu were the subject of Gerald's memoirs and have been filmed numerous times for TV.

Reviews

[Guille · Rating 4 out of 5]

"No escribo para aquellos que jamás se han preguntado en qué punto comienza la vida real”

Empecé esta singladura allá por marzo vaticinando lo extraordinaria que la lectura de todo El cuarteto de Alejandría sería para mí. No me equivoqué. Todo lo que ha rodeado la lectura de esta obra permanecerá en mi recuerdo como un acontecimiento muy especial.

“Lo curioso es que aquellas pocas palabras y su risa sofocada e irónica hayan podido hacer lo que nadie pudo hacer por mí. De pronto, sentí que todo cambiaba, se aligeraba, se ponía en movimiento. Me sentía débil, casi enferma. Estaba perpleja. Más tarde, poco a poco, se fue abriendo un claro. Era una sensación como la de escapar a una mano paralizada.”

Como no podía ser de otra forma, Clea es una despedida. Aunque aporta alguna que otra novedad, se encarga de cerrar los temas pendientes, si bien nos deja con algunas preguntas que cada uno responderá a su manera. No es la mejor de las cuatro novelas, aunque hayamos vuelto a disfrutar del lirismo de la voz de Darley a la que habíamos echado de menos en el capítulo anterior y nos haya puesto con el corazón en un puño en varias ocasiones. Con ella termina todo este inventario de amores y amantes que ha sido el cuarteto, casi todos trágicos, alguno imposible o inalcanzable o incomprensible o solo soñado o prohibido, el que solo emerge bajo ciertos condicionantes y hasta el cómico tiene aquí su lugar.

“¡Una palabra única, «amor», define tantas especies distintas de un mismo animal!”

Un animal este que nos perturba, capaz de transformarnos y transformar engañosamente en lo que creemos necesitar al objeto de nuestro amor (“¡Estaba allí para siempre, y no había existido jamás!” ), que nos miente al hacernos creer copartícipes de una unidad ("Por más cerca que deseamos estar de la criatura amada, así, tan separados permanecemos siempre."), que no admite la honestidad, que nos confirma en nuestra soledad, “un absoluto que lo toma o lo pierde todo” , que todo lo trastoca (”Una ciudad se convierte en un mundo cuando se ama a uno de sus habitantes” ), una enfermedad, una locura, una obsesión. Todo es más placentero en su ausencia.

“Así dejamos correr el tiempo, y así hubiéramos podido quedar, como figuras estáticas de un cuadro olvidado, saboreando sin prisa la dicha concedida a los seres destinados a gozarse mutuamente sin reservas ni autodesprecio, sin los premeditados ropajes del egoísmo, las limitaciones inventadas del amor humano.”

Y solo un poco menos terrible que el amor, la picadura del arte, la aspiración de ser escritor, …

“El arte, como un hábil masajista en un campo de juegos, está siempre alerto para ayudar a sanar heridas y golpes; y como los del masajista, sus oficios alivian las tensiones musculares de la psique. Por eso busca siempre las zonas de dolor, oprime con los dedos los ligamentos musculares, los tendones acalambrados, los pecados, las perversiones, todo lo desagradable y molesto que nos repugna admitir. Una ternura áspera que afloja las tensiones, relaja la psique.”

… pero también la gran esperanza de la humanidad, capaz incluso de poner los cimientos a una nueva sociedad.

“El animal humano será sacado de la jaula, y se limpiará su sucia paja cultural y sus restos coprolíticos de creencias. Y el espíritu humano, radiante de luz y de alegría, hollará suavemente el pasto verde como un danzarín; surgirá para cohabitar con las formas de tiempo y procrear hijos al mundo de lo elemental, ondinas y salamandras sílfides y silvestres, Gnomos y Vulcanos, ángeles y elfos. Sí, para que la sensualidad física llegue hasta las matemáticas y la teología; para alimentar, no para obstruir las intuiciones.”

Pero sobre todo, un gran anhelo individual que puede dar sentido a lo que, de todas formas, nunca lo tendrá.

"Aguardo, serena y dichosa, convertida en auténtica criatura humana, en una artista por fin. Clea."

“Sí, un día me encontré escribiendo con dedos temblorosos las cuatro palabras (¡cuatro letras!, ¡cuatro rostros!) con las que todo artista desde que el mundo es mundo ha ofrecido su escueto mensaje a sus congéneres. Las palabras que presagian simplemente la vieja historia de un artista maduro. Escribí: «Érase que se era. . . » Y sentí que el Universo entero me daba un abrazo.”

[Yücel · Rating 5 out of 5]

İsterdim ki herkes okusun, aldığım tadı alsın. Bir yandan da biliyorum ki herkese tavsiye edilecek bir eser değil, gerek hacmiyle olsun gerek de niteliği açısından. Bir kere kolay okunur bir eser değil, kesinlikle. Hele ki sabırsız okur için hiç değil. Sadece olay örgüsü ile de değil, yazım dili de zor anlaşılır bir eser. Eminim ki çevirisi de çok zahmetli olmuştur.

Gerçek hayatta olduğu gibi bu eserde de “yaşananlar” ‘ın sadece tek bir gerçek versiyonu var. Yine gerçek hayatta olduğu gibi bu eserde de “yaşananlar” olaylara dahil olanların farklı bakış açılarından algılanıyor, işleniyor ve herkesin kendine göre bir Gerçek versiyonu oluşuyor. İşte o Gerçeğe sanki bir meyvenin kat kat olmuş kabuklarını sıra sıra açar gibi ulaşmaya çalışıyoruz okur olarak. Eserin her cildiyle birlikte bir kat daha yaklaşıyoruz, Gerçeğin üstündeki sisi yavaş yavaş dağıtıyoruz. Onlarca karakter, yıllar geçiyor, onlarla birlikte yaşlanıyoruz, ölüyoruz, deliriyoruz vs. Olmaz dediğiniz her şey oluyor. Gerçek hayatta kader dediğimiz şey her ne ise sayfa sayfa görüyoruz. Durrell öyle cümleler kurup yaşamla ilgili öyle (bana göre) doğru saptamalar yapıyor ki bazı satırları hatta paragrafları dönüp dönüp okudum. İskenderiye zaten başlı başına bir roman karakteri gibi, caddelerini kafelerini berberlerini öğrenip, yıllar geçtikçe değiştiğini görmeye başlıyorsunuz okurken.

Uzun zamandır kendi kendime “şu anda inanılmaz güzel bir şey okuyorum” dememiştim. Muhtemelen bir süre sonra Avignon Beşlisi’ni de okurum gibi geliyor.

[Fuchsia Groan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Por distintas razones me es complicado escribir un comentario sobre El cuarteto de Alejandría. Los recuerdos de las novelas, las reflexiones en ellas escritas y las que yo he hecho a mi vez, las relaciones entre los personajes y las mías propias, las conversaciones que he mantenido y las que he leído... todo se entremezcla en mi mente de una manera que vista desde fuera podría resultar extraña. El cuarteto ha pasado a formar parte de mi vida como ningún libro lo había hecho antes.

Muchas veces se escuchan afirmaciones del tipo "este libro me ha cambiado la vida". Nunca me ha ocurrido, tampoco en esta ocasión. Al contrario: mi vida ha marcado el cuarteto, mis experiencias le han dado una nueva dimensión. La lectura enriquece al que lee, sin duda, pero no es menos cierto lo contrario: la vida enriquece inmensamente la lectura. Y este es el motivo por el que estas cuatro novelas han pasado directamente a mi lista de favoritos: porque me han hablado de mí misma, he sentido que, de un modo insólito, se dirigían directamente a mí.

No escribo para aquellos que jamás se han preguntado en qué punto comienza la vida real.

Muchas veces me he preguntado cuándo llegaría, qué sería exactamente ese punto, ese suceso con el que todo comienza, con el que todo cobra al fin algo de sentido: la aparición de una persona, la toma de una decisión difícil, un acontecimiento fortuito, el conseguir dejar atrás ciertas cosas, la persecución de un sueño que una vez alcanzado lo cambiará todo... siempre algo futuro, algo incierto, algo que seguramente cuando llega no es del todo suficiente. Quizás todo sea mucho más sencillo. Quizás ese punto que lo cambia todo es algo interno, algo íntimo que supone una perturbación, un despertar, una sacudida tras la que ya no hay marcha atrás. Puede ser a través de esa persona nueva, de un sentimiento que nace y no esperabas, cualquier cosa, pero es siempre una transformación interna. La "vida real" empieza quizás en el momento en que uno comienza a encontrarse a sí mismo, una búsqueda que una vez empieza no termina nunca: Crecer lleva toda una vida. La gente ya no tiene paciencia.

Para Durrell el amor tiene una importancia fundamental en todo esto. No le llevaré la contraria: De pronto, sentí que todo cambiaba, se aligeraba, se ponía en movimiento. Me sentía débil, casi enferma. Estaba perpleja. Más tarde, poco a poco, se fue abriendo un claro. Era una sensación como la de escapar a una mano paralizada.

El cuarteto de Alejandría es fundamentalmente una búsqueda. La política del amor, las intrigas del deseo, el bien y el mal, la virtud y el capricho, el amor y el crimen... las conspiraciones y contraconspiraciones. Pero sobre todo de dos cosas:

Por un lado, de la verdad, de lo que es real y lo que no: Vivimos –escribe Pursewarden– vidas que se basan en una selección de hechos imaginarios. Nuestra visión de la realidad está condicionada por nuestra posición en el espacio y en el tiempo, no por nuestra personalidad, como nos complacemos en creer. Por eso toda interpretación de la realidad se funda en una posición única. Dos pasos al este o al oeste, y todo el cuadro cambia.

“Recrear la realidad”, escribí en alguna parte; palabras temerarias y presuntuosas, por cierto, pues es la realidad la que nos crea y recrea en su lenta rueda.

Esta búsqueda de la verdad afecta incluso a la estructura de las novelas (tres lados de espacio, Justine, Balthazar, Mountolive, y uno de tiempo, Clea): Supongo (escribe Balthazar) que si usted decidiera incorporar ahora a su propio manuscrito sobre Justine lo que le estoy diciendo, se encontraría en presencia de un libro curioso; la historia sería narrada, por así decirlo, en estratos. ¡Sin quererlo le he proporcionado una forma fuera de lo común! No está lejos de la idea de Pursewarden sobre una serie de novelas que fueran como “paneles corredizos”, así los llamaba. O quizá como un palimpsesto medieval en el cual se consignan verdades diferentes, unas sobre otras, las unas suprimiendo o quizá completando las otras.

Por otro lado, como decía, la búsqueda de uno mismo, de la "vida real", que aquí se realiza en su mayor parte a través del amor, planteado como necesidad, algo de lo que no podemos escapar, que forma parte del aprendizaje para llegar a conocernos profundamente, alcancemos o no finalmente ese Amor.

Desde esos amores que separan (vínculos más estrechos, que, aunque parezca paradójico, separan más de lo que unen, cosa que la ilusión humana se niega a reconocer), que tratan de algún modo de esclavizar al otro y a quien esclavizan en realidad es a uno mismo (la necesidad de poseer, si no es satisfecha, transforma en poseído al propio espíritu), que convierten a la persona amada en lo que no es, en un objeto idolatrado, para, si el amor se termina, convertirla de nuevo en otra cosa, algo ajeno, puede que incluso desagradable.

Nuestro tema, Hermano Asno, es el mismo, siempre e irremediablemente el mismo; te deletreo la palabra: a-m-o-r, cuatro letras, cada letra un volumen. ¡El point fable de la psique humana, la verdadera raíz del carcinoma máximo!

Pero ya un personaje avisa desde el principio: En el amor hay algo que no llamaré imperfecto, porque la imperfección está en nosotros, pero sí algo que no hemos comprendido. (…) Puede presentarse en infinidad de formas, y volcarse en una infinidad de personas. Quizás eso que no hemos comprendido es que es todo mucho más sencillo de lo que imaginamos, que es algo tan fácil como navegar en un bote o zambullirse en aguas profundas.

Que lo único que hemos de buscar es ser figuras estáticas de un cuadro olvidado, saboreando sin prisa la dicha concedida a los seres destinados a gozarse mutuamente sin reservas ni autodesprecio, sin los premeditados ropajes del egoísmo, las limitaciones inventadas del amor humano.

Que quizás algún día comprenderemos que basta con el amor, despojado al fin de todos esos otros sentimientos que lo empañan, lo distorsionan y nos lastiman, los celos, la posesión y el egoísmo, que amor es eso, amor, y que puede llegar a darnos justamente lo contrario de lo que creíamos: nada más y nada menos que el júbilo de una libertad totalmente desconocida, que puede llegar a convertirse en nuestro sitio, por primera vez me parecía natural encontrarme donde me encontraba, un sentimiento que nunca separa: "Por más cerca que deseamos estar de la criatura amada, así, tan separados permanecemos siempre", escribe Arnauti. Aquella frase no reflejaba ya nuestra verdad.

Que el amor es, simplemente, un refugio de felicidad animal que ninguna palabra podrá expresar jamás.

Toda lectura, especialmente cuando estamos ante una gran obra como esta de Durrell, es una experiencia personalísima. Por eso, aunque creo que objetivamente los dos primeros tomos son los que realmente podemos considerar obras maestras, siendo los dos siguientes muy buenos, tengo que darle ahora la máxima calificación a Clea. Abro la novela, leo la última frase y recuerdo incluso qué estaba haciendo exactamente cuando la terminé, un lunes de julio por la tarde. Y sentí que el Universo entero me daba un abrazo.

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

The final part of the Quartet and it’s been a wonderful journey. Not quite as strong, I thought, as the other three. It is set about seven years later. Darley has been living on a Greek island looking after Melissa’s daughter (with Nessim). Balthasar arrives with information and writing from the late Pursewarden. Many of the aps from the previous novels are filled in.
Darley returns to Alexandria, reuniting Nessim with his daughter. He bumps into Clea and begins a romantic relationship with her. It is Clea and her relationship with Darley that takes centre stage. The Quartet seems to hang together as a result of this novel and the prose is still wonderful. There were one or two ends that didn’t quite convince me (Justine for instance), but on the whole again Durrell has created a masterpiece. Darley is as short-sighted as ever when it comes to his romantic entanglements. The events of the war intertwine this novel and Alexandria is in the hands of the Free French. There are some neat comic touches; the late cross-dressing Scobie is now an unofficial saint and has his own feast day. All of the main participants take some sort of bow.
Durrell indulges himself in all sorts of meditations covering art, the novel and creativity, set within the outstanding writing and the Freudian allusions. The fragments from Pursewarden add a great deal and an edge of cynicism and weirdness. At the centre of it all though is the nature of love and more particularly how miserable it can make you! The whole thing is a look at modern civilisation and its decadence. I also think Durrell is looking at the nature of truth because he looks at events from several different angles and points of view making the reader question their original judgement.
The Quartet is a great achievement and the prose so beautiful it defies description. I enjoyed the first three slightly more than this one, but they stand alone as a whole.

[merixien · Rating 5 out of 5]

Her kitapta daha öncekilerin sırlarını çözen bir seriyi tamamladım bu kitapla. En kısa zamanda bütün seri üzerinden daha detaylı bir yorum ekleyeceğim. Eğer uzun uzun cümlelerin peşinden, hiç gitmediğiniz bir şehrin sokaklarında gezmek, o karakterlerle bütünleşmeyi içselleştirmeyi seviyorsanız bu dörtlemeyi mutlaka okuyun.

[Edita · Rating 4 out of 5]

Would it not, I wondered, be wiser to stay where I was? Perhaps. Yet I knew I must go. Indeed this very night I should be gone! The thought itself was so hard to grasp that I was forced to whisper it aloud to myself.
*
Dawn was breaking among the olives, silvering their still leaves.
*
How could I help but think of the past towards which we were returning across the dense thickets of time, across the familiar pathways of the Greek sea? The night slid past me, an unrolling ribbon of darkness. The warm sea-wind brushed my cheek — soft as the brush of a fox. Between sleep and waking I lay, feeling the tug of memory’s heavy plumb-line: tug of the leaf-veined city which my memory had peopled with masks, malign and beautiful at once.
*
‘Yet the truth’ I said ‘is that I feel no resentment for the past. On the contrary I am full of gratitude because an experience which was perhaps banal in itself (even disgusting for you) was for me immeasurably enriching!’
*
But now, then, tell me — which of us was the greater liar? I cheated you, you cheated yourself.
*
Perhaps our only sickness is to desire a truth which we cannot bear rather than to rest content with the fictions we manufacture out of each other.’
*
I wasn’t sure that the cycle would really change, I didn’t know how much you had or hadn’t changed yourself. You are such a bloody correspondent I hadn’t any way of judging about your inside state of mind. Such a long time since you wrote, isn’t it?
*
But I am aware the test may come under any guise, perhaps even in the physical world by a blow between the eyes or a few lines scribbled in pencil on the back of an envelope left in a café. The heraldic reality can strike from any point, above or below: it is not particular. But without it the enigma will remain. You may travel round the world and colonize the ends of the earth with your lines and yet never hear the singing yourself.
*
Yes, one day I found myself writing down with trembling fingers the four words (four letters! four faces!) with which every story-teller since the world began has staked his slender claim to the attention of his fellow-men. Words which presage simply the old story of an artist coming of age. I wrote: ‘Once upon a time….’
And I felt as if the whole universe had given me a nudge!

[Brodolomi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nakon što je vremenski odsečak događaja sagledan kroz tri prostorne dimenzije - dužinu (Justina), širinu (Baltazar) i visinu (Mauntoliv) - Darel u Klei, četvrtom delu Aleksandrijskog kvarteta, dozvoljava priči da krene dalje kroz vreme. Darli se vraća u Aleksandriju nakon više godina i to za vreme Drugog svetskog rata. Grad je na istom mestu, više prilagođen ratnoj situaciji nego promenjen. Da je baš tako, data nam je još jedna flanerska zagledanost u grad sa zadivljujućim detaljima ostvarenim drskim stilskim sredstvima koji treba da sugerišu orijentalnu poraznu lepotu (i kraljevski grad i Anus Mundi). Nekad mi se čini da bih bio sasvim zadovoljan da je čitav roman ispisan u vidu deskripcije Darlijeve imaginarne Aleksandrije. U Egiptu susreće već poznate likove. Naravno sureće ih uslovno, pošto u Darelovom imaginarijumu Drugi ne postoji, postoji samo sopstvo koje se suočava sa problemom samotkrivanje. Sve opisane strasti, prijateljstva, izdaje predstavljeni u četvoroknjižju rađaju se iz neznanja o drugome, jer u Darelovoj viziji sveta niko ne zna ništa o onom drugom, onaj drugi uvek prikazuje odabrane izmišljotine, a onda ga zaljubljeni boji u skladu sa potrebama ljubavi koju je izmislilio.

Ono što ostaje jesu sećanja, a u postprustovskoj književnosti sećanja su kaleidoskopi. Povratak Darlija u Egipat čini da se stare uspomene uskomešaju. Neke su mile i prijatne, druge grube – „kraste starih osećanja koje će uskoro otpasti“. Kontrolisanje i procenjivanje dragocenih „ostatka oseta“, kako ih je Kolridž nazivao, čine ispripovedane događaje iz prethodna tri dela živim. Ali je odnos prema njima promenjen. Jednu ljubav iz prošlosti Darli će uporediti sa iznošenom čarapom, drugu sa mrtvom pticom skvrčenih kandži zagralavljenom u slivniku. Iako jedan dobar deo četvrtog dela otpada na, da baš slobodno parfraziram Kavafijev stih, osunčavanje emotivnih starudija, žao mi je što ih nema još više. Onda bi se sva četiri dela bila baš čvrsto cementirana. Ovako, Darel dobar deo četvrtog dela opet posvećuje erotskim sparivanjem junaka u kombinacijama koje još uvek nije upotrebio u prethodna tri. Malo postaje zamorno i ponavljajuće, naizgled bez plana (plus četvrti deo nosi u sebi najmanje intrige). Ali razumem, Aleksandrijski kvartet je u Darelovim stremljenjima trebalo da bude promišljanje o moder(noj)ističkoj ljubavi, te se nije mogao odreći svoje teme. A i zašto bi? I onda dođe poslednje poglavlje u vidu dva pisma i i taj osećaj jednog od najzadovoljavajućih krajeva nekog romana u mom čitalačkom iskustvu – junak je pred vratima bekstva iz lavirinta aporija ljubavi.

[Ian "Marvin" Graye · Rating 4 out of 5]

This Precious Image

"Mountolive", the third volume in "The Alexandria Quartet", initially alienated me, but totally turned me around.

"Clea" started in the same manner, but more patient this time, I let it work its magic. It fell into place much more quickly, and the rewards came sooner as well.

Initially, I wondered whether it might be a grab bag of ideas and impressions stitched together as an afterthought to what might otherwise have constituted a trilogy.

Even if it had been conceived of as a trilogy, "Clea" fits in neatly. It is set some years later, both during and after the war. Whereas some of the relationships in the earlier volumes were still jostling around with the heat, by now they have started to settle. People have matured. They've worked out what they're seeking after. They've started to find it. Some, however, have moved on or shuffled off this mortal coil.

Most importantly, for the narrator Darley, he's now remote enough from the original events that he has lost some of his timidness, he has emerged with a perspective (or at least a composite of multiple perspectives), he has realised that he is ready to write about these events, and he has decided what form his project should take:

"It had been so long in forming inside me, this precious image...the old story of an artist coming of age."

The Kingdom of Your Imagination

So, just as the Quartet is a story about Alexandria and its inhabitants ("When you are in love with one of its inhabitants, a city can become the world"), it's also a story of an artist delving into the past and readying himself to write about it.

Although Darley feels that "the whole universe had given me a nudge", it's Clea who has seen what the universe had in store for him and, indeed, for herself:

"As for you, wise one, I have a feeling that you too perhaps have stepped across the threshold into the kingdom of your imagination, to take possession of it once and for all."

Each is now "a real human being, an artist at last."

Finding Your Self in the World

"Clea" is probably the densest of the four novels in terms of plot. It's also the most linear, to the extent that it even hints at a happy ending.

However, its concerns seem to revolve around the questions: what does it mean to live? What does it mean to love? What does it mean to be an artist? What does the imagination have to do with the truth?

In concepts (if not necessarily language) that evoke Hegel, the writer Pursewarden theorises:

"The so-called act of living is really an act of the imagination. The world - which we always visualise as 'the outside World' - yields only to self-exploration!"

Thus, we have to explore ourselves in order to understand the world. By the same token, if we explore the outside world, we will also understand ourselves better.

Hence, by understanding the city, we will understand its inhabitants. And vice versa.

Pursewarden's Inkling of the Truth

Pursewarden often seems to be the vehicle by which Durrell allows Darley to acquire wisdom, without necessarily realising the immediate or abstract significance of what is happening before his very eyes. Part of the novel's metafiction involves Darley reading Pursewarden's correspondence, journals and draft fiction and verse:

"Seeing Pursewarden thus, for the first time, I saw that through his work he had been seeking for the very tenderness of logic itself, of the Way Things Are; not the logic of syllogism or the tidemarks of the emotions, but the real essence of fact-finding, the naked truth, the Inkling...the whole pointless Joke."

Action and Reflection

Another writer character, Keats, adds, "The man of action and the man of reflection are really the same man, operating on two different fields. But to the same end!"

For an artist at least, you need to be both a man of action and a man of reflection. Each quality informs the other.

Meddling with Time

Pursewarden makes a similar point in relation to Proust:

"Time is the catch! Space is a concrete idea, but Time is abstract...In the scar tissue of Proust's great poem you see that so clearly; his work is the great academy of the time-consciousness. But being unwilling to mobilise the meaning of time he was driven to fall back on memory, the ancestor of hope! Ah! But being a Jew he had hope - and with Hope comes the irresistible desire to meddle."

This passage seems to imply that Proust focused on memory in the absence of action in the present. Yet, it also suggests that Proust was prone to hope and meddle, presumably in relation to the future. Perhaps, then, Pursewarden (in contrast to Proust) focuses more on the present than either the past or the future. The present is the only facet of Time that can be immediately influenced and mobilised by Man.

Yet Pursewarden suggests that, in trying to mobilise the progress of Time into the future, this other manifestation of Man ("we Celts") has the opposite problem to the Jewish predicament of hopefulness:

"We Celts mate with despair out of which alone grows laughter and the desperate romance of the eternally hopeless. We hunt the unattainable, and for us there is only a search unending."

Selective Fictions

No matter what the characters think they can achieve by acts of will, a sense of determinism occasionally creeps into the novel.

The past seems to shape both the present and the future:

"It was indeed another island - I suppose the past always is. Here for a night and a day I lived the life of an echo, thinking much about the past and about us all moving in it, the 'selective fictions' which life shuffles out like a pack of cards, mixing and dividing, withdrawing and restoring."

If at times we seem to be actors on the stage of life, have our lines already been written for us? Or are our choices simply limited to the number of cards in the pack?

The Seeds of Future Events

Darley, looking back on events in the the past, in preparation for writing about it, says:

"It is not hard, writing at this remove in time, to realise that it had already happened, had been ordained in such a way and in no other. This was, so to speak, only its 'coming to pass' - its stage of manifestation...The seeds of future events are carried within ourselves. They are implicit in us and unfold according to the laws of their own nature."

It's almost as if our character determines our fate. Perhaps, not just our own fate, but we all contribute to the passage of history, which is just a record of the passage of Time.

In a beautiful musical analogy, Darley writes to Clea that the individual events in our lives might "plant themselves in the speculative mind like single notes of music belonging to some larger composition which I suppose one will never hear."

The Poisoned Loving-Cup

Throughout the novel, various permutations and combinations share a loving cup. But Darley refers to it as a "poisoned loving cup".

Obviously, some lovers were never meant for each other at all. However, Clea is the first to appreciate that love can often be a matter of timing. It doesn't help that this is love during wartime:

"I shall see if I can't will him back again. We aren't quite ripe for each other yet. It will come."

The Richest Love

Durrell reserves some of his most beautiful writing for these moments of intimacy:

"So it was that love-making itself became a kind of challenge to the whirlwind outside which beat and pounded like a thunderstorm of guns and sirens, igniting the pale skies of the city with the magnificence of its lightning-flashes. And kisses themselves became charged with the deliberate affirmation which can come only from the foreknowledge and presence of death. It would have been good to die at any moment then, for love and death had somewhere joined hands.

"It was an expression of her pride, too, to sleep there in the crook of my arm like a wild bird exhausted by its struggles with a limed twig, for all the world as if it were an ordinary summer night of peace." *

But perhaps it should be Pursewarden who has the last word:

"The richest love is that which submits to the arbitration of time."

We must love as if this is the only time available to us. Because, when all is said and done, this much is true.



REVIEWS OF "THE ALEXANDRIA QUARTET":

"Justine" (Vol. 1 of 4)

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

"Balthazar" (Vol. 2 of 4)

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

"Mountolive" (Vol. 3 of 4)

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...



FOOOTNOTE:

* When I read John Hawkes' "The Lime Twig", I didn't think to look up the literal meaning of its title. This second reference impelled me to:

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birdlime

http://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/lime-...

[Eylül Görmüş · Rating 5 out of 5]

Şunu diyeyim: İşte bunun için okuyorum. Bunu bulmak için, buna varmak için. Hayatımda okuduğum en görkemli, en lezzetli, en olağanüstü şeylerden birini tamamladım Clea ile. Yeni yıla bu muazzam dörtlüyü okuyarak başlamak nasıl doğru bir kararmış! İskenderiye Dörtlüsü herkese önerilecek bir eser değil, herkesin seveceği bir eser de değil muhakkak. Zor çünkü, okurdan emek ve çaba talep ediyor ancak karşılığını da misliyle veriyor. Dili çok süslü evet, ancak cümleler aynı anda hem ihtişamlı hem zarif olmayı becerebilince işte o zaman o çok bayıldığım şey ortaya çıkıyor: barok. Barok edebiyat, layıkıyla becerilince beni hakikaten büyülüyor, bunu yapabilen yazar sayısı da ziyadesiyle az maalesef. Bu dörtlemeyse barok edebiyatın okuduğum en iyi örneklerinden biri olarak kalacak zihnimde – ve sadece zihnimde de değil açıkçası; kalbimde, tenimde. Bir acayip prizma gibi – her kitapta görüş açınızı değiştirip gerçeği başka bir yerden sunma işini öyle bir incelikle başarmış ki yazar, tarif etmesi güç hakikaten. “Bir sanat yapıtı hayata, hayatın benzemediği kadar benzer” derken haklıymışsın Durrell. Yarattığın onca müthiş karakterle ama en çok da -tıpkı Kayıp Zamanın İzinde’nin baş kahramanının M. değil zaman olması gibi- kitabının baş kahramanı olan senin İskenderiye’nle tanıştığım için çok mutluyum. İyi ki okudum. Edebiyat işte tam da böyle olmalı. Bin teşekkürle şimdilik elveda İskenderiye. Bir gün sana geri döneceğime emin gibiyim. “Yastıkta onun izini bulmaya çalıştım. İnsan anıyı tekrar bulmak için her şeyi denemeli. Gizlenebileceği öyle çok yer var ki.”

[Teresa · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Para alguns, entre nós, o implacável dia chega
Da grande escolha, da grande decisão
De dizer Sim ou Não.
Aquele que em si sentir a sede de afirmar
Pronuncie-se sem demora.
Os caminhos da vida abrir-se-ão para ele
Numa cornucópia de benesses.
Mas o outro, o que nega,
Ninguém o poderá acusar de falsidade,
E repetirá cada vez mais alto a sua descrença.
Está no seu direito — e, contudo, esta pequena diferença.
Um "Não" por um "Sim" — afunda uma vida inteira."
— Konstandinos Kavafis

Quem pretender ler algo sobre O Quarteto de Alexandria, de Lawrence Durrell, pesquise outras opiniões que, por aqui, foram publicadas e não perca tempo a ler o que se segue, pois se trata de pouco mais que devaneios meus...
Fica a sugestão. Quem quiser continuar, depois não se queixe...

Há livros que, por vários motivos, estão ligados à nossa vida pessoal o que torna a sua leitura especial.
Comprei o Quarteto há anos; li as primeiras páginas e, não sei porquê, arrumei-o na estante. Algures no tempo e indirectamente, foi "um bater de asa de uma borboleta" que provocou um "tufão" na minha vida. Continuou à espera. Há dias, chegou o momento pelo qual ele esperou para me levar de regresso ao Egipto... Nada acontece por acaso...

"Mas podemos deixar de amar secretamente os lugares onde mais sofremos?"

E pudemos deixar de amar secretamente os lugares onde fomos felizes?
Fui feliz, há muitos anos, no Egipto com dois seres a quem muito quero.
Fui feliz, nestes últimos dias, em Alexandria com Justine, Baltasar, Mountolive e Clea; com Leila, Narouz, Darley e Liza; com Nessim, Amaril, Melissa e Scobie, Ah! E com Purswarden!
Nunca nunca deixarei de os amar!

Ingleses, egípcios, irlandeses,...; judeus, árabes, coptas,...; escritores, pintores, médicos,... e uma cidade mágica onde vivem homens e mulheres livres e, simultaneamente, acorrentados ao que faz mover o mundo: O Amor! O amor em estado puro que não se subjuga a raças, religiões, sexos...

Durrell é magnífico! Quer na criação de gente, quer na forma como nos conta as suas vidas, as suas paixões.

O romance foi estruturado, segundo disse Durrell, tendo como base a Teoria da Relatividade. Os três primeiros livros representam o espaço e o último o tempo. Em Justine - o primeiro - as personagens são apresentadas e revelados os principais acontecimentos: quem faz o quê; quem ama quem; e até quem morre. Nos dois livros seguintes as situações são aprofundadas e acrescentados novos pormenores. No entanto, a evolução temporal só acontece no volume final.

Não posso dizer que seja uma leitura simples, não só pela extensão (quase mil páginas), mas porque exige alguma concentração para não nos perdermos devido ao grande número de personagens e histórias secundárias. Tem, também, algumas partes que me custaram muito a ler; relatos de uma crueldade atroz, e cuja arte narrativa de Durrell as gravou, dolorosamente, na minha mente.

Além das personagens que enumerei e de muitas outras que faltam, há duas que, embora não correspondam aos padrões, estão quase sempre presentes: a cidade de Alexandria e Kavafis, referido várias vezes como "o velho poeta da cidade".

"Continua a voltar frequentemente e a tomar-me,
sensação amada continua a voltar e a tomar-me —
quando acorda a memória do corpo,
e desejo antigo volta a passar no sangue;
quando os lábios e a pele se lembram,
e sentem as mãos como se tocassem de novo.

Continua a voltar frequentemente e a tomar-me à noite,
quando os lábios e a pele se lembram..."
— Konstandinos Kavafis

[Jenny (Reading Envy) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Over ten years ago, I read the first book of the Alexandria Quartet by Lawrence Durrell. This summer I read books 3 & 4. Clea is the final book of the quartet and takes some of the characters' stories to their conclusions, and reveals hidden truths of others. Clea herself is more of a focus and serves as Darley's connector back to Alexandria, even if it has grown more sordid with the war.

As always the writing is astounding even if I had to look up all the French and many of the English words. Durrell always manages to capture the mood of heightened importance many of the characters possess and the distinctions between people because of their backgrounds. This book is a bit of a conglomoration of other texts - the journal and letters of Pursewarden, a satisfying letter from Leila that changes some of the previous volume, the poetry of Cavafy, quotes from characters in previous books of the same quartet (is it pretentious for Durrell to quote himself? I don't know. It adds a feeling of nostalgia but I liked those passages when I first encountered them best; they don't belong to this volume as such.)

The city has changed, but colonialism lives on as Darley and friends continue to make love and go drinking as the harbor is bombed. It's quite unnerving, actually, how sheltered they believe themselves to be (whereas Justine and Nessim are virtually in hiding and are only in the background.) Clea's determination to carry on despite the changes in the city and the increased danger struck a chord with me, as it feels similar to our ongoing pandemic living situations.

"I always believed that a love of human beings would flower more strongly out of a common misfortune. It isn't true... To be here, just the two of us, sitting by candle-light is almost a miracle in such a world. You can't blame me for trying to hoard and protect it against the intrusive world outside, can you?"

And Darley thinks to himself, "...from the depths of my own inner selfishness I was glad of these external pressures, for they circumscribed our world perfectly, penned us up more closely together, isolated us!"

And that's the completion of a formerly unfinished series or book sets for the Reading Envy Summer Reading challenge - to finish a series.

[Ahmed · Rating 4 out of 5]

رباعية الاسكندريه , ياالله على الجمال .
عندما يتحدث أى أجنبى عن مدينة أو مكان ما , فأنت امام احتمالين :
-ان يشوه فى هذا المكان (او يُجمل فيه) أى يغلب رأيه الشخصى
-أو أن يقدم شخصيات وأحداث بوجهة نظر حياديه عن مكان يعشقه.
فى هذا العمل : أجنبى يتحدث عن مدينه من أعرق مدن العالم (وهى الإسكندريه) من خلال شخصيات انتقاها بعنايه ليقدم من خلالها وجهة نظره.
(من قرأ شيكاغو سيفهم وجهة نظرى) لكن الفرق بين ما قام به العظيم علاء الأسوانى وما قام به لورنس: هو ان الأسوانى كان يُركز فى المقام الأول على تأثير الغربه على المصريين ولم يتعمق فى المدينه نفسها (وهى شيكاغو) أما (لورنس داريل) فقد رسم لوحة متكاملة الألوان عن مدينه غريبه لها سحرها الخاص. مدينه صبغت الغريب بصبغتها ووضعت بصمتها على من يعيش فيها حتى لو غريب عنها.
الممتع فى هذه الرباعيه هى الشخصيات بصراحه (وخاصة الشخصيات الرئيسه) :
فمن خلال هذه الشخصيات قدم لنا : المشاعر المختلفه (حب وكره واحترام واحتقار) وقدم لنا الغرائز من جنس وحب قوة وحب سلطه مُمثله فى شخصياته.
عمل عظيم (بل مشروع عظيم) .
أكثر عمل أعجبنى هو هذاالجزء : (كلِيا) : فقد قدم لنا الأنثى بسحرها وغموضها وإثارتها وثورتها . بجنونها وعبقريتها وما بين الاثنين من خيط واهن.
الأنثى بكل جمالها وجاذبيتها .
قدم لنا مركز الكون ومصدر بهجته وسعادته وايضا مصدر تعاسته وحيرته
بكل بساطه قدم لنا : الأنثى.

[Lorna]

Having just finished Clea, the fourth book in the Alexandria Quartet, I am in awe at the beauty and immensity of this series by Lawrence Durrell written in the 1950s. The first three novels in the Alexandria series were Justine, Balthazar, and Mountolive. These books concerned the same characters during the same period of time but each book revealed them from a different point of view providing new insights as the truth became more complicated and elusive. But in Clea, we see the same group of people but in this book, it is now during World War II and thus a chronological sequel. But its narrator is the same Irish poet who wrote Justine and parts of Balthazar, Darby. The writing is rich and luscious with humor, wit and poetry. This has been lauded as the single most important group of books in our lifetime, and I must agree. Lawrence Durrell has created a masterpiece of literature for us to enjoy. And it is also a love affair with the city of Alexandria and all of its beauty. I loved it from the very first book through the last book that essentially tied it all together. Amazing piece of work.

“This celebrated tetralogy from the 1950s was defined by its author as ‘an investigation of modern love,’ but has often been regarded as and evocation of a city of Greco-Arab, multi-ethnic Alexandria of its title.”

“For it is true that the city of Alexandria does color the entire work.”

[T.D. Whittle · Rating 5 out of 5]

I found that I enjoyed each book more than the last, in this legendary quartet. Justine was of course well written (they all are exquisitely written) but I wasn't sure I would continue the series because the constant psychoanalysing of the titular character by the narrator was killing it for me (defeating me, I should say, as killing has taken on quite other meanings these days). I resumed with Balthazar because I was missing the virtual experience of being in Egypt, as seen through the writer's eyes, and found it better than the first though still not quite what I'd hoped for or expected (though I myself can hardly say what that was).

Nevertheless, I was glad to continue soaking up LD's desert heat while reading by the fire during a chilly Victorian winter in Australia. Mountolive I liked very much, more than the first two, so after finishing it I rolled right on into Clea. I loved this last one and it made me appreciate the whole quartet more in retrospect, while not changing my mind about how frustratingly banal and irritating I found Justine.

What I said in my review of the first book remains true through the last, which is this: For myself, I believe that deep emotions are better felt silently and inferred subtly, than dissected crudely, with chilly needles; that spirituality is better lived-out quietly than preached loudly by fools; that drunken, hollow cynicism shared at the bar is best kept at the bar.

I think what jaded me against LD's characters (with a few exceptions, such as Nessim, Leila, Clea, and Balthazar when he was acting as a doctor) is that over and over again we hear how remarkable these men are supposed to be but there is so little to support that declaration. The most striking example of this is Pursewarden, who is viewed by his friends, ultimately, as a far-seeing mystic and profound genius. This is preposterous to me because nothing he says or does, ironic or straight, ever supports that idea of him. For the longest time, I thought perhaps this is because people do always have distorted views of each other, and we try to make the most of those we love. And we were all once very young. But, after a particular incident which I shall not disclose, we learn that Pursewarden is hailed as a singular genius by others, too, right up there with the likes of Blake and Keats (!!!). I cannot tell if LD was joking or not. Perhaps he was. There is quite a lot of humour in the series. I am fully willing to admit that there may be things I overlooked or misunderstood, and am willing to be schooled by more knowledgeable readers.

Anyway, having made my way to the end now, I have a great respect for LD's gorgeous lyrical prose, his way of looking at his characters' lives prismatically (a difficult undertaking, I've no doubt) which added richness and interest as one continued reading, and his astonishing ability to immerse a reader in a particular time and place and really bring it to life.

I don't have a lot to say because I am tired from staying up reading all night; but if you too could use a deep immersion into a hot and fascinating ancient city that is long gone, or perhaps never existed except in LD's imagination, I can recommend no better set of books than these. Go for the cheerful seaside cafes and the festive nightlife, and linger on til the end for the romance of the thing.

[Cenk Karagören · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dörtlemenin baş karakteri İskenderiye. Romandaki karakterlerin gerçek aşkı, arkadaşı, annesi, babası, sığınakları hatta servetlerinin kaynağı bile İskenderiye. Roman boyunca sokaklarıyla, gelenekleriyle, insanlarıyla, kozmopolitliğiyle kent muhteşem bir şekilde anlatılıyor. Ama bu İskenderiye’nin ne kadar gerçek olduğu tartışılır. Batılı bir gözle anlatılan bir Doğu kenti. Zaten anlatı hatırlamak üzerine, hatırladığımız her şey de aslında bir yeniden yaratımdan ibaret. Ben bu kente Durrell’in İskenderiye’si demenin daha doğru olduğunu düşünüyorum.

Bugünden bakınca romanda okuru rahatsız eden bolca şey var. Dil cinsiyetçi. Kadının temsili sorunlu. Doğulular roman boyunca kendilerine ancak hizmetçi, berber gibi rollerde yer bulabiliyorlar (Doğulu Hıristiyanlar biraz daha şanslı) ama ben metinleri yazıldığı dönemin şartlarını gözeterek değerlendirmenin daha doğru olduğunu düşünüyorum. Romandaki karakterler batının tedrisatından geçip doğuya gelmiş insanlar. Doğuya dair bilgileri ve beklentileri belli, o dönem batının doğuya bakışı da belli, yani bugün okurken bizi rahatsız eden şeyler aslında o dönem İskenderiye’ye gelen bir batılının zihnini yansıtmaktan ibaret. Hatta bu açıdan bakarsak bayağı başarılı olduğu da söylenebilir. O devrin şartlarını ve karakterlerin zihin yapısını yansıtma dışında metnin ya da yazarın olumsuz bir perspektifi olduğunu düşünmüyorum.

Muhteşem bir anlatım, Ülker İnce’den muhteşem bir Türkçe. İnanılmaz benzetmelerle dolu bir metin. Şiirsel dili sadece devrik cümle kurmaktan ibaret sananlara şunu bir oku da gel denilecek kitaplardan biri bu. Duygunun bu kadar ön planda olduğu bir anlatıda dil bence böyle olmalı.

Romanın alışılmadık bir yapısı var. Kabaca 3+1 gibi düşünülebilir. İlk üç cilt kronolojik olarak sıralanmayan, birbirinin içine geçmiş bölümlerden oluşuyor. Tıpkı hatırlama gibi. Yani olması gerektiği gibi. Dördüncü ciltse hikayeyi toparlayan klasik yıllar sonra fikri. Taze bitirdiğim için bu söyleyeceğimden çok emin değilim ama ben son cildin varolmaması gerektiğini düşünüyorum. Evet hikayenin bütün boşluklarını dolduruyor, tek başına da çok iyi bir kitap sadece havuz sahnesi bile yeter ama ben ilk üç ciltteki yapıyı bozduğunu düşünüyorum.

[Judy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sadly, I have come to the end of The Alexandria Quartet*. It has been a revelatory reading experience and I now see why this dated collection is still read, praised, even loved.

I found Clea the weakest of the four, perhaps because Durrell is winding down, as is the historic city of Alexandria. (These days it is considered an unsafe location for tourists.) During the time covered by Clea, the British Empire's heyday is coming to a close. In his inimitable way, Durrell infuses all of this into a sad farewell.

Clea, who had always been a shadowy presence in the earlier novels, now has her day. She is an artist, a painter. Of all the women in the Quartet, she comes across as the most well balanced; a sort of Earth Mother figure and the feminist of the bunch. The nararator (whom I assume is Durrell himself) finally has a love affair with her. He is older and wiser now, but Clea is wiser still.

The End.

*The Books of the Alexandria Quartet:
Justine, Balthazar, Mountolive, Clea

[Darwin8u · Rating 4 out of 5]

Will review tomorrow.

[Joy D · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the final book in the Alexandria Quartet. As the story opens, Darley is returning to Alexandria at the beginning of World War II. The narrative focuses on the relationship between Darley and Clea, characters introduced in earlier books. Darley was the protagonist of book one (Justine), and Clea has been a minor character up to this point. The storyline between Darley and Clea is broken by excerpts from Pursewarden’s journal. He has influenced events throughout the quartet. We learn about his views on the nature of art and the artist, along with the reason for his prior actions.

This set is character-driven. The sights and sounds of a past Alexandria are featured prominently. The writing is beautiful, and I have gotten used to Durrell’s style over the course of the four books. I appreciate it more now than I did at first. It is a fitting conclusion that relates what happened to all the main characters we have come to know and love.

This is my second favorite of the set. I enjoyed the final two books the most. It is really a single work told in four parts. None of the four would stand alone very well. After finishing, I appreciate the entire work more than I did while reading the individual installments. It has taken me quite a long while to get through all the books (this is a work that should not be rushed through) but am glad I took the time to read it.

[Mehrnaz · Rating 4 out of 5]

از بین کتابهای این چهارگانه کتاب سوم(مونت آلیو)رو بیشتر از همه دوست داشتم،شاید چون فقط راوی این جلد دانای کل بود و با راوی بقیه جلدها اونطور که باید و شاید ارتباط نگرفتم.
داستان این جلد ۶ سال بعد از اتفاقات جلد های قبل رو روایت میکنه و به نوعی سرانجام همه شخصیت ها درش اومده در پایان این جلد باید بگم که چهارگانه واقعا ارزش خوندن رو داره و خیلی خوشحالم که این کتاب به فارسی هم ترجمه شده.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

After an absence of 7 years or so we return to Alexandria during the last year of WWII with the reliable Darley as narrator. It seems that Durrell actually intends to give us some resolution to this multi-faceted story, so we revisit the same cast of characters, some now dead, some forever altered ..it's difficult to even conjure up the first impressions I had of this exotic bunch.

Of course, the emotional thrust of the story revolves around Clea, someone that we've only met obliquely in the earlier books. She is an interesting study, but perhaps less interesting than when she was only a hint. But then again, Darley doesn't always get things right, and he's not even convinced that he is a worthy writer. To be honest, I didn't like Durrell's last picture of Justine, arguably the linchpin of these books. But is this Durrell's perspective or Darley's, or is Darley just a self-effacing projection of Durrell?

I've talked too much. The ending contains a nice edge of your seat adventure and a smile on your face conclusion. And of course the language is rich and sometimes surprising. It's all been a rewarding journey and I will miss these friends.

[David Carrasco · Rating 5 out of 5]

¿Y si la única forma de curarse del pasado fuera atravesarlo con los ojos abiertos, como quien camina por un incendio con los bolsillos llenos de cartas sin enviar?

Clea no es un epílogo, ni una reconciliación, ni mucho menos un cierre. Es la última copa que te tomas con alguien que ya sabes que te va a romper el corazón. Y aún así te la bebes. Porque Clea, como el resto del Cuarteto de Alejandría, de Lawrence Durrell, no viene a ofrecer conclusiones, sino a quemarte lo que creías saber. Es el cuarto movimiento de una sinfonía que empezó en susurros sensuales ( Justine ), se torció en cinismo ( Balthazar ), se hundió en política ( Mountolive ) y ahora vuelve al inicio, pero con las cicatrices a la vista.

Pero nada vuelve igual. Lo que cambia aquí no es tanto el qué, sino el cómo. Vuelve Darley como narrador, años después, pero no es el mismo. Ya no es ese joven febril que se perdía en el perfume de Justine o en las metáforas sobre el amor como laberinto. Ahora escribe desde la distancia —no solo temporal, también emocional— y eso lo cambia todo. La voz narrativa ha madurado, y aunque la prosa de Durrell sigue siendo exuberante, se nota un nuevo equilibrio: la belleza sigue ahí, pero con una melancolía contenida, como si cada adjetivo llevara puesto un luto invisible. Y es esa melancolía la que tiñe toda la arquitectura narrativa.

Narrativamente, Clea parece dar la vuelta al círculo: volvemos a la mirada introspectiva de Darley, pero lo que antes era un diario de sensaciones ahora es casi un testamento emocional. La guerra ha llegado, los personajes han envejecido o desaparecido, y Alejandría ya no es ese bazar de espejismos sensuales, sino un lugar herido, desfigurado. Y, sin embargo, sigue siendo magnética. Como esas ciudades donde uno no puede vivir, pero tampoco puede olvidar. Durrell consigue lo impensable: mostrar la decadencia sin perder el deseo. Su Alejandría final es como una mujer que ha sobrevivido a demasiadas fiestas, pero sigue bailando con los labios pintados de rojo. Y como ella, los que la habitaron también han cambiado.

El reencuentro con los personajes tiene algo de fantasmagórico. Nessim, Justine, Naruz, Pursewarden (aunque él aparece solo en la sombra de sus palabras) ya no son los dioses trágicos de las primeras novelas. Ahora son seres humanos, quebrados, cansados, con la mirada hacia adentro. La propia Clea, que siempre había sido un misterio lateral, adquiere aquí una presencia luminosa y contradictoria. Es artista, es amante, es testigo. No es musa ni arquetipo: es persona. Y eso, en el mundo de Durrell, es una forma de revelación. Clea es, quizás, la única que ha entendido algo. La única que no intenta poseer ni ser poseída. Y Darley, por fin, empieza a escucharla. Y cuando por fin la escucha, uno comprende que esta historia ya no va de ellos, sino de todo lo que arrastran.

Y en ese diálogo tardío, casi en voz baja, empieza a revelarse el tono real de la novela. Una novela que no tiene grandes giros ni revelaciones. No los necesita. Es el gesto opuesto al espectáculo: un descenso íntimo, una lenta digestión de todo lo vivido. Y sin embargo, Clea emociona como pocas. Tiene pasajes que cortan como la verdad dicha en voz baja. Tiene un duelo submarino que parece sacado de un sueño simbolista, y que, en manos de otro autor, sería ridículo, pero que Durrell convierte en metáfora pura de lo que significa luchar contra el pasado, sumergirse en uno mismo, salir empapado y sin respuestas. Y tiene páginas de una ternura brutal, como si Durrell —tan propenso a la ironía y al artificio— de pronto se permitiera escribir con la piel.

Hay ecos, aquí, de otros finales no felices. Me viene a la mente La montaña mágica , cuando Hans Castorp camina entre la nieve sabiendo que no volverá. O El cuaderno dorado de Lessing, con esa sensación de que todo lo vivido tiene que ser reescrito para poder sobrevivir. También hay algo de Proust, claro, en esa idea de que el tiempo no es lineal y que solo al final entendemos de verdad el inicio. Pero Durrell no imita: digiere. Toma esas resonancias y las pliega sobre su propia estructura, cerrando el Cuarteto como se cierra una carta que jamás se enviará, pero que necesitaba ser escrita.

Porque al final, ¿para qué escribimos si no es para intentar acercarnos a alguien que nunca terminamos de entender? Uno de los temas centrales de Clea —y quizá del Cuarteto entero— es precisamente la imposibilidad de conocer al otro. Y aun así, seguimos intentándolo. Seguimos escribiendo cartas, poemas, diarios. Seguimos haciendo arte. Como si sospecháramos que la belleza no sirve para salvarnos, pero sí para acompañarnos. La novela insiste en esa tensión entre lo que recordamos y lo que fue, entre lo que sentimos y lo que supimos después. Es una elegía del deseo, sí, pero también una defensa del presente. Porque Clea no mira hacia atrás con nostalgia: mira hacia atrás para poder seguir adelante. Y eso, en literatura, es un gesto profundamente valiente.

Quizá por eso la pregunta no es si los personajes encuentran la paz, sino si al menos logran entender qué fue lo que les dolió. ¿Hay redención en Clea? No. Pero hay comprensión. Y a veces, eso es más poderoso. Porque lo que nos mata no es la tragedia, sino no entenderla. Uno sospecha que, al escribir esta última parte, Durrell no buscaba epatar, sino simplemente decir adiós con honestidad. Y esa honestidad es rara, y duele, y se agradece. Por eso Clea es, paradójicamente, el volumen más humano de los cuatro. El menos brillante, quizá. El menos citado. Pero también el más necesario. Porque es donde todo encaja. Y donde, por fin, alguien deja de hablar para empezar a escuchar.

Y cuando por fin alguien escucha, lo que queda no es una respuesta, sino un eco. Un murmullo persistente que se parece más a una ciudad que a una conclusión. Porque cuando cierras Clea, no sientes haber leído el final de una saga. Sientes haber salido de una ciudad que ya no existe, pero que te sigue hablando en sueños. Una ciudad donde el amor era un idioma extranjero, la política una obra de teatro decadente, y la verdad… la verdad era solo un espejismo con buenas intenciones. No lo has entendido todo. Ni falta que hace. Has estado allí. Has respirado ese aire denso. Has amado a quien no debías. Has escrito palabras que nadie leerá. Y eso, amigo lector, es más que suficiente.

Ahora sí. Se cierra el telón. Pero el eco sigue sonando.

Terminar el Cuarteto de Alejandría es como despertarse en una ciudad que ya no existe, con la sensación absurda de haber amado a gente que nunca conociste. Hay libros que se cierran; este se queda abierto como una herida vieja, de esas que uno ya ni cura ni exhibe, solo aprende a llevar encima.

Lo que Durrell construyó en estas cuatro novelas no es una historia, ni una saga, ni siquiera un rompecabezas. Es un organismo vivo. Y lo es porque respira contradicción, se alimenta de perspectivas en guerra y suda deseo, política y literatura como un cuerpo febril. Justine nos dio el perfume de lo imposible. Balthazar nos arrebató la ingenuidad. Mountolive nos dio el golpe de realidad. Clea nos dejó la conciencia del tiempo. Y entre los cuatro, sin que uno anule al otro, se fue gestando ese milagro incómodo que es entender que toda narración es, en el fondo, un autoengaño lúcido.

Durrell no escribió el Cuarteto para contar una historia. Lo escribió para dinamitarla desde dentro. Por eso cada volumen reescribe el anterior, lo desmiente, lo caricaturiza, lo pervierte. Es como si el autor nos dijera: mira, te mentí, pero con estilo. Y ahora voy a mostrarte otra mentira más profunda. Y luego otra. Hasta que entiendas que no hay fondo, solo capas. Lo que parece técnica narrativa es en realidad una filosofía sobre la imposibilidad de conocer. Alejandría no es un lugar, es un espejo empañado.

Y qué decir de los personajes. Qué extraña forma de presencia tienen: intensos, rotos, inasibles. No viven en la trama, viven en la relectura. Son como esas personas que uno recuerda de forma distinta cada vez, según el momento en que las evocamos. Justine, Nessim, Pursewarden, Darley, Clea... no son personajes: son síntomas. De una época, de un lenguaje, de una forma de amar y de no poder decirlo sin fingir que se dice.

Pero quizá lo más brutal del Cuarteto es cómo transforma la manera de leer. No solo porque obliga a estar alerta, a releer frases que parecían inocuas y luego se cargan de ambigüedad como minas bajo la arena. Sino porque, cuando uno termina el último volumen, entiende que nunca hubo una sola lectura posible. Y eso, para un lector, es devastador y adictivo. Como si Durrell no escribiera libros, sino trampas de percepción.

Sí, hay algo teatral en todo esto. Algo que recuerda a Pirandello, a Nabokov, incluso a Faulkner en su fase más delirante. Pero con un perfume propio, más decadente, más sensual, más árabe en lo emocional y más europeo en la culpa. A ratos parece una novela modernista disfrazada de folletín, y a ratos un tratado filosófico con corsé de novela erótica. Y sin embargo, funciona. Porque no se puede contar el deseo, la memoria y el poder desde un solo ángulo. Durrell lo sabía. Por eso construyó una catedral de espejos. Para que al final no sepamos si lo que vemos es la ciudad, los personajes, o simplemente nuestro reflejo distorsionado.

¿Recomendar el Cuarteto? Sí, pero con advertencia: este no es un viaje para turistas. Es para los que están dispuestos a perderse sin mapa. Para los que aceptan que la literatura no está para darnos certezas, sino para quitárnoslas con elegancia.

Durrell no pide fe. Pide complicidad. Y si te la saca, no es con argumentos, sino con atmósfera. Terminas Clea y sabes que nada se resolvió, pero que todo cambió. Como la vida, pero con mejores diálogos.

Alejandría ya no existe. Quizá nunca existió. Pero algo de ella se nos ha quedado pegado en la piel. Y no se va. Ni con agua. Ni con años.

(Esta reseña pretende ser también un homenaje al Cuarteto completo. Si has llegado hasta aquí, gracias por leer hasta el eco.)

[Erkan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ve dörtleme yine doyurucu bir kitapla sona erdi. bir yazarın yazmış olduğu metne bu kadar hakim olabilmesi, yüzlerce sayfa boyunca onu kurgulayabilmesi, edebi olarak bu kadar mahir olmasına şaşırıyorum. bazı insanlar yazmak için doğuyorlar sanki, öyle iyi yazıp öyle güzel karakter ve metinler yaratıyorlar ki yarı tanrı rolüne bürünüveriyorlar adeta.

içerik olarak belki de dörtlünün en zayıf kitabıydı, çok fazla şey olmadı ama edebi olarak her sayfada zirveyi zorlayan bir romandı. hoş serinin diğer kitapları da üç aşağı beş yukarı böyle, arada cok büyük fark da yok aslında. durrell dört romanın da her satırını o kadar bilinçli ve planlı yazmış ki bu durum (seri boyunca) tıpkı kalan hersey gibi öyle olması gerektiği için olmuştur, bilinçlidir. ben buna yüzde yüz ikna olmus durumdayım. kendinizi durrell'e güven içinde teslim edebilirsiniz :)

[Julia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Last of the Alexandria Quartet. I've quoted from the other three, so here's a bit of Clea: "A phrase of Pursewarden's came into my mind as I softly closed the door of the ward. 'The richest love is that which submits to the arbitration of time.' "

Individually, any of the four is a gem. Altogether, the Quartet is magnificent. I don't love, or even like, Elizabeth Gilbert, but I read a quote of hers a bit ago about listening in a college freshman English class to some dude saying how Harper Lee was a one-hit-wonder. And how ludicrous that is to say about someone who wrote a definitive (perhaps the definitive) novel on racism in America.

I feel similarly about Durrell. I don't care if he wrote another damn word, because the Quartet is a masterpiece. The language is eloquent, the plot more intricate and surprising than I could have anticipated, and the total accomplishment is beautiful. It's hard, perhaps impossible, to summarize four unique novels succinctly, let alone attempt to describe their cohesive whole. But, a treasure!

[Jonfaith · Rating 3 out of 5]

Like all young men I set out to be a genius, but mercifully laughter intervened.

Wow, I didn't expect such a sudden dislike. Allow me to retreat to my hutch to scratch together a review.

[Roger Brunyate · Rating 3 out of 5]

Incestuous

[NOTE: This review is intended for people who have read at least the first three volumes of The Alexandria Quartet. I do not recommend starting the series with Clea, and these notes will not be helpful to those that do.]

Lawrence Durrell set himself a huge challenge in his Alexandria Quartet: three volumes looking at the same events from different angles, and a fourth that would extend the story forward in time; he intended it as an analogy to the three dimensions of space and the one of time. I had found it a little difficult to get into the first volume, Justine, because the combination of the almost incestuous doings of a cosmopolitan coterie in Alexandria in the late 1930s, coupled with Durrell's perfumed prose, was too exotic a cocktail for me at first. But by the end of the first volume, I was wanting more, and read its successors, Balthazar and especially Mountolive, with increasing enjoyment. There only remained this fourth novel, Clea, to complete the story and make a fitting capstone to the whole impressive edifice. Unfortunately, I feel it fails to live up to the challenge.

After the clarity of the third-person narrative of Mountolive, it was a shock to return to the author's own voice once again—or rather that of Darley, as the writer calls himself in the novels. Durrell still writes well; there is a marvelous set piece early in the book when he approaches Alexandria by sea during a wartime blackout, only to have it suddenly appear out of the darkness in the flare of searchlights, tracer bullets, and incendiary bombs. But I found myself resisting the cloying atmosphere and verbal navel-gazing that I had thought were a thing of the past. I am sure this is deliberate, though; when Darley again meets Justine, his siren from the first novel, she has spilt a bottle of perfume over herself, and the entire encounter is bathed in its almost nauseating aroma. The scene is a pair for the one at the end of Mountolive when David finally sees Leila again; Durrell's characters, it seems, cannot just revisit former loves and part as friends; there needs to be an additional twist of the knife as well.

For the most part, the promise to carry the story forward in time takes the form of "Whatever happened to so-and-so?" I am reminded of sitting in on my mother's tea-parties as a child, hearing her catch up with news of old friends from school or college days, people that meant nothing to me. True, we have met all these characters in the earlier books, but Mountolive in particular has brought them into the light of the real world; I find myself no longer interested in re-entering the darkness of their self-obsessions. And so much of this catching-up is handled obliquely: we hear stories passed on by a third person; we read long confessional letters; no less than three separate people, apparently endowed with the power of ventriloquism, give imitations of the dead Scobie, telling tall stories in his voice. Only a very few characters are allowed to speak directly of their experiences, and remarkably little happens in this book that is new—though when something does, in the swimming party near the end, Durrell at least equals the exciting climaxes of his other novels.

Durrell said that he wanted to explore the many varieties of love. As though to swell the catalogue, Mountolive has a brief mention of incest, which is picked up again here. Not in much detail or with any prurience (or very believably either), but that is relatively unimportant. For it is a perfect symbol for a book that is itself incestuous. There is a long excursus in the middle of the book ostensibly taken from the journals of the novelist Pursewarden, in which he describes his impressions of Darley. From the beginning, I felt that this figure was introduced as a slightly comic alter ego for the writer, and indeed he propounds many of the theories that Durrell himself attempts in the Quartet. Mountolive achieves the feat of pulling Pursewarden out of comedy and giving him true stature as an individual. But the Darley of Clea returns to a lesser avatar of Pursewarden, as a kind of fun-house mirror for himself. So we have a thirty-page passage of one writer dissecting another, both alter-egos of the author. How's that for navel-gazing? What is it if not incestuous?

It is incestuous, too, for an author to manipulate his characters instead of letting the story be driven by their personalities; there is an arbitrary quality to most of the resolutions here. Even the central relationship between Darley and Clea seems to come about too easily, rather than as the product of the interplay of personalities revealed in this novel; and when the relationship later encounters difficulty, that too is largely arbitrary and unexplained. As for the rest, it is as though Durrell lined up his characters like pieces on a board, saying "Let's see, who have I not yet paired with whom?" Indeed, in an appendix entitled "Workpoints," Durrell offers further character combinations that the reader can develop for himself if he cares to do so. The author, it seems, has become a mere gamesman. A pity, for this great undertaking had promised so much more.

[James · Rating 2 out of 5]

Without question the weakest volume of the Quartet. I thought it had a really pointless, tacked-on, Godfather III quality. Durrell admitted in a Paris Review interview that he had a tendency to procrastinate and then work really quickly when he found himself in severe financial straits. "Ideally, had I not been short of money, I would have written the four, and matched them properly, because there are still quite a lot of discrepancies which will have to be tidied up if the thing is gathered. But shortage of money made me compose them one after the other." He spent, he said, a total of seven weeks on Clea.
As a result, I think, his prose frequently suffers from a deadly combination of pretension and inattention. Someone who goes on about the role of the Artist as much as Durrell does shouldn't be so indifferent to the discipline of craft. When he's on, as he is, for example, in the carnival episode of the Mulid of El Scob that effectively concludes Clea, Durrell evokes the physical world with a pleasingly impressionistic synesthesia. His "A"-game prose is poetic in the best sense of that over-used word. When he's not on, the effect of the purple description can be nauseously over-rich, the narrative consists of endless passages of soporific and shallow self-examination punctuated by calculatedly shocking plot-goosing, and the characters come across as either iterations of the same narcissistic hothouse flower or absurdly cartoonish caricatures. In Clea, three characters do page-long 'impressions' of the dead Scobie, presumably because Durrell couldn't bear to part with the 'colorful' comic qualities of a character he'd thoughtlessly killed off.
Mostly dead wood, I'm afraid.

[Korcan Derinsu · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5/5

Clea ile birlikte İskenderiye Dörtlüsü’nü tamamlamış oldum. Clea’nın serinin en zayıf halkası olduğunu düşünüyorum. Evet birçok soru cevabını buluyor, evet Clea bence harika bir karakter, evet İskenderiye tasvirleri yine şahane ama adını koyamadığım bir eksiklik (aslında fazlalık, dağınıklık) hali var. Üstüne serinin kendine has o heyecanını bulamayınca yer yer sıkıldım, tam da bu yüzden kitabın kusurları daha bir gözüme battı. Belki iddialı bir laf olacak ama ben serinin ilk iki kitapla amacına ulaştığını ve fazlasıyla “iyi” olduğunu düşünüyorum. Mountolive ve Clea’nın ise -çemberi kapatan, eksikleri tamamlayan kitaplar olmalarına rağmen- çıtanın altında kalan ve “olmasalar da olurmuş” dedirten eserler olduklarına inanıyorum. Buna rağmen seriyi okuduğum için fazlasıyla mutluyum.

[Alan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Clea is the fourth and final installment of Lawrence Durrell's Alexandria Quartet. If you have not already done so, you should read the others—in sequence—before starting this one. I toyed with the notion of reading these out of order myself, but in the end I'm glad I stuck with the way Durrell presented them. And if you thought perhaps Durrell would run out of material after writing three other books on the same subjects... quite the contrary; there are many revelations here, events not visible from the perspectives of the earlier books, and some shocking turns that—retroactively—force significant reassessments of his subjects.

Clea herself, of course, is the beautiful blonde artist, whose entanglement with the dark and lovely Justine added some salacious interest to Justine, and who created the portrait of Justine that gives the narrator Darley such comfort in his island exile... we've met her before, briefly, but despite having been given a few of the best lines in the earlier books, Clea's been very much a peripheral character up till now. And—unlike Justine and Mountolive—Clea takes her time appearing on the stage even in her namesake book.

Balthazar also delayed his appearance, but unlike his analytical, other-directed presence in Balthazar, once Clea does come under our direct gaze, she is fully present. Her opinions and desires consume both Darley's full attention and our own.

Clea is, to a greater extent than its predecessors, explicitly about the interplay between men and women, and it is the only volume of the four to contain passages that I would consider purely and unself-consciously erotic. In returning to a tight focus on Darley and one woman, from a more mature (or at least more experienced) perspective, Durrell does something quite opposite to the prospect Pursewarden deplores so loudly—in no way does he "put a tea-cosy over reality" (p.137—o felicitous phrase!).

Where Clea isn't about Darley and Clea, in fact, it's primarily about Pursewarden—the fragile, brilliant author whose notebook "My Conversations with Brother Ass" makes up a big chunk of this book's middle third. Pursewarden's thoughts, and by that we must mean Durrell's own, could make a whole book of aphorisms in and of themselves:

The imperatives from which there is no escape are: Laugh till it hurts, and hurt till you laugh!
—Pursewarden, p.138

And the intriguing notion:

I mean, wasn't the idea of the individual soul grafted on to us by the Greeks in the wild hope that, by its sheer beauty, it would "take"—as we say of vaccination?
—Pursewarden, p.148

But then also this bit of weirdness:

For culture means sex, the root-knowledge, and where the faculty is derailed or crippled, its derivatives like religion come up dwarfed or contorted—instead of the emblematic mystic rose you get Judaic cauliflowers like Mormons or Vegetarians, instead of artists you get cry-babies, instead of philosophy semantics.
—Pursewarden, p.141

Am I disloyal in wanting to read Pursewarden's idealized and cynical books—the missing fifth element of the Quartet, presented here only in fragments—perhaps even more than Darley's own memoir? No, for Darley, as a surrogate for Durrell though far from being his wish-fulfillment "Mary Sue," admits that he himself would rather read Pursewarden's prose. Darley says, after his reading of "Brother Ass" has ended,

And realizing this I was suddenly afflicted by a great melancholy and despair at recognising the completely limited nature of my own powers, hedged about as they were by the limitations of an intelligence too powerful for itself, and lacking in sheer word-magic, in propulsion, in passion, to achieve this other world of artistic fulfilment.
—Darley, p.177

Not that Darley is any more generally reliable or truthful in this novel—with the reader or with himself—than he is in Justine. He congratulates himself (on p.56) upon his insight into Woman: "the fecund passivity with which, like the moon, she borrows her second-hand light from the male sun," forsooth! Quite possibly Durrell himself did not feel this way, but even so there is not in Darley's phrase the slightest hint that he's aware of how ridiculous this denial of independent agency might appear to half of the human race.

And yet, elsewhere, observations such as this ring true to me:

"{...}women instinctively like a man with plenty of female in him; there, they suspect, is the only sort of lover who can sufficiently identify himself with them to... deliver them of being just women, catalysts, strops, oil-stones."
—Clea, p.108.

The covers of this particular edition, I must admit, are not all that great. I like the narrow font, and the whimsical placement of each title on its respective cover. And the photographs are good enough, evocative of Egypt without being too specific as to place or time. But those images do not evoke for me any sense of Durrell's four novels as a unified work, nor do they imply—as I think they should—the explicitly four-dimensional aspects of the Quartet. For Durrell's project is nothing less than the construction of a multidimensional perspective on a single series of events, a "science-fiction" (in his own words) based on a view of space-time as a unified continuum.

This view jibes so well with my own opinions about how the universe works that I have a hard time being objective about it, but I do believe that Durrell succeeded admirably. From the myopic focus of Justine, peering through the space between two lovers lying eye to eye, to the horizontal separation in Balthazar with its idyllic island exile, to the aloof view from above in Mountolive... and now, in Clea, Durrell returns to Alexandria and to a tighter focus on two lovers, but views them from the irremediable perspective of time.

That recurring word, "irremediable," seems to set the key note—the events of the earlier books have receded inexorably into the past. The advent of World War II, as well—long looming in the other books—affects both the tone and the view of Clea's Alexandria:

It had come so softly towards us over the waters, this war; gradually, as clouds which quietly fill in a horizon from end to end. But as yet it had not broken. Only the rumour of it gripped the heart with conflicting hopes and fears. At first it had seemed to portend the end of the so-called civilised world, but this hope soon proved vain. No, it was to be as always simply the end of kindness and safety and moderate ways; the end of the artist's hopes, of nonchalance, of joy. Apart from this everything else about the human condition would be confirmed and emphasised; perhaps even a certain truthfulness had already begun to emerge from behind appearances, for death heightens every tension and permits us fewer of the half-truths by which we normally live.
—p.21

If I were designing new covers for these volumes, they would each show the same scene, through the four panes of a single window in Alexandria... One pane would be dedicated to each volume, but each volume's pane would be in color for that book only, and each pane would be zoomed in differently: close focus for Justine; in the middle distance for Balthazar; a wide-angle view for Mountolive, and... for Clea, a cracked and long-neglected glass filmed over with brown dust.

"This world represents the promise of a unique happiness which we are not well-enough equipped to grasp."
—Balthazar, p.23

Taken as a whole—and perhaps that is how I should have read the Alexandria Quartet anyway, as a single omnibus volume (such editions do exist, though that is not the one that came to my hand)—the Quartet is much more than the sum of its parts. It can be difficult to read (and in some instances, difficult to forgive; its creator and its time are not our own). But it is a landmark work of 20th-Century literature, and I am very glad to have read it.

[الزهراء الصلاحي · Rating 3 out of 5]

وأخيراً 😌

سعيدة بهذا التحدي الذي لولاه لما كنت تخطيت الجزء الأول بكل أمانة 😅

في ليلة العيد، وفي حماسة الأجواء 😂 قررت قراءة هذه الرباعية في أربعة أيام، وطوال قراءتي للجزء الأول وأنا حائرة بين الرجوع عن هذا التحدي واختيار قراءات أفضل للعيد وبين إكماله -وكله على الله- 😁
والحمد لله أن نهاية الجزء الأول كانت حماسية وجذابة وعليه أكملت باقي الأجزاء.

من وجهة نظري، الجزء الثاني كان أقوى الأجزاء.
وميزة الجزء الرابع والأخير أنه حل الكثير من الألغاز وجعلنا نقف على أرض صلبة.

في مكان واحد "الإسكندرية" وزمان واحد، دارت أحداث هذه الرواية.
الأجزاء الثلاثة الأولى كانت موازيات لبعضها، فلم تكن تضيف الكثير، بل اعتمد الكاتب على نفس الشخصيات ونفس الأحداث لكن من جوانب أخرى.
وجاء هذا الجزء متمماً للأحداث.

نظراً لأن هذه الرواية يجب أن تُقيم ككل وليس كل جزء منفرد، فأنا أرى أنها ليست سيئة لكنها أيضاً ليست بالقوة الكافية.
وتقييمي العام: 3.5/5.

تمت
١٢ يوليو ٢٠٢٢

[Aylin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Seriye toplam puanım 3,5⭐️

Goodreads okuyucuların aldığı o devasa hazzı alamadım ben bu 4 kitaptan da…
Hatta Justine ‘i okuduktan sonra bırakabilirdim. Zira Justine kitabındaki ağdalı ve gösterişli dil bana göre değildi. Yazar, serinin ilerleyen kitaplarında ise o dili epeyce bıraktı. Konulara afili bir aforizmamsı cümle ile girip, daha sonra o söylediği şeyi anlattığı karakter ile bağdaştırmasından hiç hoşlanmadım. Ama bu dediğim anlatım tarzı ilk kitapta ağırlıklı olarak var. Sonraki kitaplarda olayların ön plana alınması ile, bu kocaman söylemler epeyce azalıyor.
İskenderiye şehrini ziyaret etme imkanı olmuş birisi olarak söylüyorum ki, bu kitapta şehir beni etkisi altına falan almadı, hatta sıktı.

Yazdıklarım eserin edebi değeri ile ilgili değil elbette. Benim alamadığım keyif ile ilgili…

Justine’i okuyup seriye devam etmeyenler varsa, serinin devam kitaplarından (benim gibi)biraz daha fazla keyif alabilecekleri tavsiyem ile belki Baltazar’a bir şans verirler.