Overview

This book by Rodge Glass, the award-winning novelist, short story writer and biographer, is the first ever detailed assessment of Michel Faber’s life and work across genre and form. It draws on intimate, wide-ranging interviews with the author over a two-year period and investigates previously unexplored archival material, from the Canongate Books records to Faber’s own personal archive, to bring fresh perspectives to light. Glass presents detailed interrogations of unpublished texts, including a novel, A Photograph of Jesus, as well as providing deep dives into Faber’s most celebrated works such as Under the Skin and The Crimson Petal and the White. Known for his hybrid creative-critical approach, Glass uses Faber’s interest in generosity and compassion in writing as a focus for this study. Grouping his works by ‘World’, the book ranges across poetry, short stories, novels and novellas to make an argument for Faber as a writer who has consistently sought to explore narrow emotional territory, that of the human instinct to seek connection with others, even if genuine connection seems unlikely or impossible. Glass draws on individual case studies across Faber’s hugely diverse body of work in a way that will be both- interesting for fans and informative for students of Faber’s writing.

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9781837644773

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Reviews

"""There were so many ""ah-hah"" moments in Rodge Glass's masterful overview of Michel Faber's work. He takes that singularly disparate oeuvre and teases out the themes that run through the hearts of each book: connection, alienation and a deep, deep compassion. It made me want to go back and start reading Faber all over again from the start."" Mat Osman, author of The Ghost Theatre and The Ruins ""This volume offers an engaging and insightful overview of Michel Faber's writing. Combining archival material and correspondence with close readings, Glass provides the best current introduction to Faber's diverse body of work, with analysis and background that will fascinate both new readers and experts. This is a witty, thoughtful book that deserves a wide readership."" Timothy C. Baker, Personal Chair in Contemporary and Scottish Literature, University of Aberdeen, and author of Reading My Mother Back ""Glass takes an author who resists easy categorisations or a simple analysis by chronology, and embraces that, examining Michel Faber's oeuvre by ""world"" and highlighting the common thread of compassion throughout them all. Illuminating and enriching, this is the perfect book for Faber fans."" Ever Dundas, author of HellSans and Goblin ""A brilliant, well-researched and accessible study."" The Scotsman ""Glass is well equipped to examine [Faber]'s somewhat unusual and interesting career... a critical work enriched by conversation and correspondence with its subject."" Allan Massie, The Scotsman ""What you see in these pages is, with careful scholarship and attentiveness - and thanks, no doubt, to a lengthy email correspondence with Faber himself - one mind working out the expansively imaginative dimensions of another."" David Robinson, Books from Scotland"

'A brilliant, well-researched and accessible study.' - The Scotsman 'Glass is well equipped to examine [Faber]'s somewhat unusual and interesting career... a critical work enriched by conversation and correspondence with its subject.' - Allan Massie, The Scotsman 'What you see in these pages is, with careful scholarship and attentiveness - and thanks, no doubt, to a lengthy email correspondence with Faber himself - one mind working out the expansively imaginative dimensions of another.' - David Robinson, Books from Scotland

Author Information

Rodge Glass is Senior Lecturer in Creative Writing at the University of Strathclyde. His previous publications include Alasdair Gray: A Secretary’s Biography (2008), Dougie’s War: A Soldier’s Story (2010), the novels No Fireworks (2005), Hope for Newborns (2008) and Bring Me the Head of Ryan Giggs (2013) and the short stories LoveSexTravelMusik: Stories for the EasyJet Generation (2013).

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