Sebastian

Sebastian or Ruling Passions (The Avignon Quintet, IV), Lawrence Durrell, Barcelona, Plaza & Janes, 1996 (1983)
The first book read, heeding the wrong words in Roman numeral of the publisher, not the first published last series of novels by Durrell. This is in order of appearance of the fourth. However, as indicated by all the criticism and reference notes, the quintet can be read independently of the others. We’ll see, it will contrast, after your reading. For now, the reader finds in Sebastian with several intersecting characters in a story halfway between Geneva and the end of World War II, surrounded by psychiatrists and psychologists who care for several characters who seem to have their role in other novels of the series. The bridge across the space is, could it be otherwise with Durrell, Alexandria  in Egypt, following the tracing of the Copts and so-called worshipers of death “, a sort of esoteric sect that permeates the essence and development of the two main characters, the wretched survivor Affad and Constance, who will star in the third installment of the author.
Another recurrent space, at the end of the history, is Provence and the city of Avignon, the city that will give rise to the first of the novels, Monsieur (or Le prince des Tenebres) I just started reading. Sebastian offers a substantial reflection on the difficulties of personal relationships, especially emotional in the changing world in crisis as the time of World War II. Durrell does not directly address any situation, but the sample, provides the intelligent reader to know that glimpse, to address, analyze and draw conclusions. There is a medical colleague Constance, Schwarz, a Jew who left his wife in Europe, in Vienna, and that by the end of the novel cannot resist the guilt to a wife who has survived the Nazi concentration camps in a very pitiful. Is Affad a fellow who seek to stop time through the fixation with death. There is the enigmatic and powerful state of being, that tries to control the will of Affad, the prince. It Mnemidis, the patient mad, tormented by religious pressure that destroys the happiness of Constance, his doctor tries to cure him.
It is the description of a changing world that disturbs the reader and motivates it to continue. Any challenge to follow the end of Durrell. A suggestive proposal, as had already been The Alexandria Quartet.