Lempriere's Dictionary: A Novel - Softcover

Norfolk, Lawrence

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0345384237 ISBN 13: 9780345384232

Publisher: Random House Publishing Group, 1993

Synopsis

"An important and inspiring novel."
VOICE LITERARY SUPPLEMENT
It is 18th-century London and John Lempriere, a young scholar, is writing a dictionary of classical mythology in an attempt to exorcise the demons raised by his father's violent and bizarre death. While tending to his father's business affairs, Lempriere discovers a 150-year old conspiracy that has kept his family from its share of the fabulously wealthy East India Company. But as John begins to untangle the years of mystery and deceit, people begin to die, in ways that mirror the very myths he is researching....

About this title

About the Author

Lawrence Norfolk was born in London in 1963. He has written four novels: Lemprière's Dictionary, The Pope's Rhinoceros, John Saturnall's Feast, and In the Shape of a Boar.

From Kirkus Reviews

A masterful debut from Londoner Norfolk that delves into 18th- century commerce by way of classical mythology, suggesting grim secrets behind the spectacular success of the East India Company- -secrets that have root in the mass suicide of Huguenots under siege in the French port city of Rochelle more that a century earlier. Deftly merging history, classical allusions, and fabulous fantasy, in a style that merits comparison to Dickens as well as Gilbert & Sullivan, Norfolk conjures up an imaginary life of John LempriŠre, actual author of a popular precursor to Bullfinch's Mythology. As an awkward young man on the isle of Jersey, John witnesses his father's violent death when assaulted by a pack of savage hounds owned by neighbor Viscount Casterleigh, whose daughter John loves with paralyzing passion. Then, while settling his father's estate in London, he learns of a mysterious contract between a distant Huguenot ancestor and an English earl, and his interest in it grows as he makes contact with others who fill in pieces of the puzzle. Meanwhile, in caverns deep beneath the city, a cabbala plots to lure young LempriŠre into their midst using member Casterleigh's daughter as bait; an assassin from the Indian Nawab' palace stalks the two; a ship full of ancient mariners, pirates all, plies its way to the London docks in pursuit of a cargo of sulphur from which to make gunpowder; and unrest among city laborers and the lower classes grows, incited by the firebrand Farina. LempriŠre comes face-to-face with the cabbala in their lair, where he finds their leader to be his own distant ancestor and learns why he was encouraged to write his dictionary, triggering a larger conflagration as the assassin, pirates, and the mob make their moves while the evil Company is destroyed, literally, by an avenging angel. Wildly and wonderfully improbable, reveling in the countless allusions that feed its dark vision: a delight for classicists, historians, and any reader eager to be overwhelmed by a story. An exceptional achievement. -- Copyright ©1992, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

About this edition

• Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
• Publication date: 1993
• ISBN 10: 0345384237
• ISBN 13: 9780345384232
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 422