[The Alexandria Quartet:] Justine; Balthazar; Mountolive; Clea.

£950 · Offered by Shapero Rare Books

'Why should not people show more than one profile at a time?' Lawrence Durrell's acclaimed series of novels, The Alexandria Quartet, comprising Justine, Balthazar, Mountolive, and Clea. All in unclipped dustjackets. At the age of 11, Durrell, who was born in the North of India near Tibet, was sent 'home' to England to be educated. He disliked living in such a different country and culture and never fully adjusted to it, even after his father's early death in 1932 when his mother returned with the rest of the family to live in England. Later, in 1935, following his first marriage, Durrell moved with his mother and his siblings to Corfu, which he felt reminded him of India. While in Greece, he drafted a novel entitled The Book of the Dead, a predecessor to his first volume of The Alexandria Quartet. However, it was only much later, in 1952, after his return to the Mediterranean, Durrell began actually writing Justine. During the 1940s he had worked for the British Information Office in Egypt. He was separated from his first wife, Nancy Myers, and in Alexandria he met Eve Cohen, a Jewish woman on whom the character of Justine is loosely based and who became his second wife. Durrell would eventually complete the quartet in France. First editions, the first vol. with a later issue dust-jacket, priced 18s net as opposed to 15s net; the remaining three vols first impressions; 4 vols; 8vo (21 x 14 cm); usual age-toning, mild spotting to prelims, no ownership inscriptions to vols 1, 3

• Binding: Hardcover

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