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There’s something uniquely exciting about discovering an old novel which is revered but has been out of print, and is revived by publishers for a new generation to discover. The two recent rediscovered gems below are well worth picking up.
They
Kay Dick
Originally written in 1977, this dystopian masterpiece has clearly been an influence on novels such as Atwood’s classic The Handmaids Tale and Ogawa’s recent award winner The Memory Police. Set in a Britain eerily similar to our own, the frightening ‘They’ of the title go around confiscating books, destroying art, erasing culture piece by piece until nothing will be left. The protagonist survives with other artists, hiding and desperately trying to preserve the civilisation which is slowly being torn from them. The creeping dread which pervades this slim novel is one which lingers long after the last page.
The Rack
A.E. Ellis
Often compared to the works of Thomas Mann and Marcel Proust, author A.E. Ellis (a pseudonym for novelist and playwright Derek Lindsay) wrote The Rack in 1958, a semi-autobiographical novel which centred on his experiences recovering from tuberculosis in the French Alps. The horror of the archaic treatments and fear for the future are neatly juxtaposed against the boredom of sanatorium life and the main character’s infatuation with a fellow patient. There’s a fascinating beauty in the monotony of convalescence, the strange figures he shares a ward with, the abstractness of the outside world just beyond reach. One of Graham Greene’s favourite books, The Rack is deservedly back in print for us all to enjoy.
