Meet Me In Mozambique, by EA Markham
Glittering alloy of a boy's dreams and an ageing man's melancholy
Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.EA Markham is a poet, writer of short stories and novelist. His new book is - well, what is it? Publishers say that the British dislike short stories, but not to worry. These stories nourish and feed off one another to such an extent that the book reads more like a kaleidoscopic novel that tells, in various voices and from different viewpoints, the lives of Pewter Stapleton and his family and friends.
Pewter is 65 years old, a writer and academic not looking forward to retirement from his students, his "harem" of 20-year-olds, to be "cast out, perhaps for ever, among people his own age". But this melancholy is reserved for the end of the book.
Until then, we have a feast of memory and invention, from his childhood on the Caribbean island of St Caesare, to life as a young man in Ladbroke Grove and visits to the pleasures of Budapest, Lampeter and the South of France.
St Caesare is a close, fictional neighbour to the volcanic island of Montserrat, where Markham was born in 1939, and which he left to come to England in the 1950s.
Pewter's mother, who is recovering from a stroke, remembers their life on the island and puzzles about her son, who has passed all sorts of exams but doesn't seem able to do anything practical.
Pewter's own memories of childhood on the island - brandy given to treat toothache, his gang called the Heathens, a boyhood dream of going to a place called China - are followed by the description of an actual trip to China, much later in life. Its purpose is to promote the game of cricket to the Chinese.
In "A Pigeon in the Fishpond", Pewter and his old friend and rival Michael Carrington jostle for position in telling a story, writing each other in and out. Two unreliable narrators - postmodernism gone mad? But it is all so deftly handled that when Pewter books a ticket to Mozambique to track down a man who turns out to be a fictional character, we can only wish him a good journey and a friendly meeting.
This is a very funny and sometimes moving book, its deadpan wit embedded in almost every line. For the past 14 years, Markham has been the professor of creative writing at Sheffield Hallam University. I hope that his students know how lucky they are to have him.
William Palmer's novel 'The India House' is published by Jonathan Cape
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments