444. Under the Volcano

Under the Volcano
Malcolm Lowry
1947
Around 425 pages

During his life Malcolm Lowry tried to strangle his wife twice, and it appears he either killed himself or his wife killed him. Juicy. Well, I don't entirely blame her for snapping, if this novel is any indication of what their life was like together.

Geoffrey Fermin is an alcoholic British consul living in Quauhnahuac, Mexico. There are plenty of stories about white men living abroad with a drinking problem, treating their wives horribly. Here's another one. Oh and there's a bullfight, because of course there's one.

I don't know, this just felt like a repeat of D.H. Lawrence, and he did it better. Lowry sounds like a very troubled person. Great writing can obviously make any perspective accessible, but I didn't find this novel to be particularly impressive.

RATING: **---

Interesting Facts:

In 1998, the Modern Library ranked Under the Volcano as 11 on its list of the 100 best English-language novels of the century. Let's take it easy.

Charles Bukowski said when he read Lowry's novel, "I yawned myself to shit."

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