In this novel, published in 1982 and written in the tradition of Thomas Hardy and D. H. Lawrence, Bruce Chatwin revives the almost forgotten genre of the pastoral, introduces readers to the Welsh-English border country, and follows the lives of identical twins, Benjamin and Lewis Jones, who have been born in 1900 and have been sleeping in their parents' bed for 42 years.
On the Black Hillis a chronicle of the Jones twins' lives, beginning with the courtship and marriage of their parents to the death, at the age of 80, of Lewis. Influenced by the tensions between their parents — a literate, imaginative, and well-traveled mother (Mary), a missionary's daughter, and a sedentary, bad-tempered, and rather inarticulate father (Amos) — Lewis and Benjamin are literate and passionate, but…
627 words
Citation: Utz, Richard. "On the Black Hill". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 17 January 2001 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=3066, accessed 22 November 2024.]
