The Book and the Brotherhood

One of the best examples of the late work of the outstanding British writer, a recognized master of subtle psychological insight, a Booker Prize laureate. The story begins at a traditional Oxford ball; we meet the entire group of characters at once, with their friendships and antipathies, loves and hatreds, with passions that consume them. Many years ago these Oxford graduates organized a sort of club (“The Brotherhood”) to support the most brilliant thinker among them, David Kersrmond, in working on an epochal political-philosophical treatise (the “Book”). The years pass, and the work has no end in sight; Kersrmond and his ideas have long since sickened everyone, but nobody dares to tell him to his face. Events take an unexpected turn when, at the ball, he leads away the wife of one of his benefactors — a second time…