In his fifth novel,
Ever After(1992), Graham Swift continues to explore the influence of the past on the present through intertwining stories of loss from the 1840s to the end of the twentieth century. Fifty-two-year-old narrator Bill Unwin self-consciously links his own losses with the spiritual crisis experienced by Matthew Pearce, a Victorian ancestor, in an attempt to construct a coherent history out of the enigmas of the past. A literature professor, Unwin readily acknowledges that he is “not in the business of strict historiography” (90). Resorting to writing after a failed suicide attempt, the one-time lecturer in English and theatrical manager, readily admits that he has never written “anything as - personal - as this” before (4). Unwin characterises his manuscript,…
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Citation: Logotheti, Anastasia. "Ever After". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 16 August 2004; last revised 13 February 2019. [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=5263, accessed 25 November 2024.]
