Alexandria Quartet

Set in the sensuous, hot environment of Alexandria just before the Second World War. Within this polyglot setting of richly idiosyncratic characters is Justine, wild and intense, wife to the wealthy business man Nessim, a mari complaisant. Her emotional and sexual wildness fuels a highly-charged atmosphere.

Justine is the first volume in The Alexandria Quartet, four interlinked novels set in the sensuous, hot environment of Alexandria just before the Second World War. Within this polyglot setting of richly idiosyncratic characters is Justine, wild and intense, wife to the wealthy businessman Nessim, a Mari complaisant. Her emotional and sexual wildness fuels a highly charged atmosphere which, caught famously by Durrell's poetic language, made Justine (1957), and the three novels that complete the Quartet — Balthazar (1958), Mountolive (1958), and Clea (1960) — both a critical and a popular success.

'The politics of love, the intrigues of desire, good and evil, virtue and caprice, love and murder, moved obscurely in the dark corners of Alexandria's streets and squares, brothels and drawing-rooms — moved like a great congress of eels in the slime of plot and counter-plot.' In Balthazar, the second volume in Durrell's Alexandria Quartet, the story and the characters come more clearly into focus. Darley, the reflective Englishman, receives from Balthazar, the pathologist, a mass of notes which attempt to explain what really happened between the tempestuous Justine, her husband Nessim, Clea the artist, and Pursewarden the writer; new figures emerge and play key roles. Balthazar, in his 'Interlinear', explains and warns.

'Mountolive who had already found the open sesame of language ready to hand, suddenly began to feel himself really penetrating a foreign country... ' In Mountolive, the third volume in Durrell's Alexandria Quartet, the events surrounding the interwoven community of Nessim, Justine, Narouz, Pursewarden and the other major characters are given a very different perspective. The intrigues and complex relationships are seen through the political prism of a world plunging towards war. David Mountolive, once emotionally involved with Nessim's set, now returns to Egypt as the British ambassador...

'I knew that Clea would share everything with me, withholding nothing – not even the look of complicity which women reserve only for their mirrors.' In Clea, the concluding part of The Alexandria Quartet, Darley returns to Alexandria now caught by war-fever. The conflagration has its effect on his circle – on Nessim and Justine, Balthazar and Clea, Mountolive and Pombal – a clarity of purpose emerges as the story moves towards its cadence.

'I knew that Clea would share everything with me, withholding nothing — not even the look of complicity which women reserve only for their mirrors.' In Clea, the concluding part of The Alexandria Quartet, Darley returns to Alexandria now caught by war-fever. The conflagration has its effect on his circle — on Nessim and Justine, Balthazar and Clea, Mountolive and Pombal — and a clarity of purpose emerges as the story moves towards its cadence.

Darley, the reflective Englishman, receives from Balthazar, the pathologist, a mass of notes which attempt to explain what really happened between the tempestuous Justine, her husband Nessim, Clea the artist, Pursewarden the writer, new figures emerge and play key roles. Balthazar, in his 'Interlinear', explains and warns.