num_pages: 202
description: A quest for meaning in a world gone mad - the fourth novel in The Avignon Quintet. At the end of World War II Sebastian, an Egyptian banker who has been living in Geneva, is chosen for a ritual death by a secret gnostic clan based in Alexandria. His autistic son is being treated by Constance, a brilliant psychoanalyst and Sebastian's former lover. Constance's attempt to reshape her life and Sebastian's quest for a death already ordained are at the center of a complex, thought-provoking story. Etched in clean prose, erotic and suspenscful, this novel probes the dark recesses of the human mind and spirit and considers the possibilities for renewal. Lawrence Durrell calls The Avignon Quintet a quincunx of novels (four items hidden in a square, with a fifth in the center). They are dependent on one another as echoes might be... books roped together like climbers on a rockface, but independent. Worth reading for the suspenscful story, the originality of plot and the unique vision of life that is Lawrence Durrell's.
language: English
title: Sebastian: Or Ruling Passions
titlecomplete: Sebastian: Or Ruling Passions
genres: Fiction, British Literature, Novels, Historical Fiction, 20th Century
ratings_count: 121
series: The Avignon Quintet
publisher: Viking Press