Kirjahaku

John Trenear, an 84 year old widower, lives alone in a bleak London tower block. He has turned away from a world he finds alien, its customs and beliefs so different from the Christian simplicities of his Cornish childhood. He tweets not, neither does he watch TV. Consequently, when the coronavirus strikes and lockdown is imposed, he has no idea what is happening; Corona to him means only the fizzy soft drink he enjoyed as a child. On VE Day there are no Corona bottles being opened with an explosion of fizz, as they had in the merry street party he remembers: indeed the streets below his flat are incomprehensibly empty. But the day brings him added confusion and distress, for it appears that something called a 'hate crime' has been committed. Corona Man, a study of old age, confusion and isolation, is both very poignant and very funny. D. M. Thomas is an internationally known poet and novelist. His third novel, The White Hotel, considered a modern classic, has been translated into more than thirty languages. His most recent work of fiction, Hunters in the Snow (2014) is also published by the Cornovia Press. He lives in his native Cornwall with his fourth wife Angela. Being incompetent at gardening, trying out new recipes or assembling giant jigsaw puzzles, he has spent the months of lockdown writing this fictional verse journal.

Vienna in the early 20th century was, in the words of our protagonist and narrator, a soulless, syphilitic whore of a city; a turbulent and bubbling melting pot of races, creeds and politics, rapidly expanding as it strained to contain the ever-increasing multitudes. In such places the nightmare moments of modern history are conceived. This novel is a fictionalised account of those who were to change the very collective psyche of mankind. It is a vivid and poignant portrayal of the sometimes thin dividing line between becoming good or evil. D. M. Thomas is a British novelist and poet, born and living in Cornwall. His novel The White Hotel was an international bestseller and shortlisted for the Booker Prize. It is rightly considered a modern classic, translated into more than 30 languages. John Updike said of the book: 'Astonishing ... A forthright sensuality mixed with a fine historical feeling for the nightmare moments in modern history, a dreamlike fluidity and quickness'; the statement could equally be applied to Hunters in the Snow.

In both his poetry and his novels, such as the iconic world-bestseller The White Hotel, D. M. Thomas has followed his own vision, ignoring the fashionable and the expected. The Last Waltz is no exception. The impression it leaves is of experience, personal and historical, distilled over a life stretching from the threat of Hitler to the threat to freedom of thought and speech today. The moods vary, from grief to controlled anger to satirical humour; the themes, from falling in love on his first day at Infants school to a royal wedding competing in our news (successfully) with Palestinians being massacred. All explored with immense assurance in a rich variety of forms. 'There aren't many poets in England as good as Thomas.' - The Guardian.