I have just begun to re-read Lawrence Durrell’s “Alexandria Quartet”. Like Stella Gibbon’s Cold Comfort Farm, it is one of those literary creations to which I feel compelled to return every now and then. It only occurred to me today that, like Cold Comfort Farm, Durrell’s Alexandria is a very untidy place. The difference between them, of course, is that Flora Poste is on admission to tidy up Cold Comfort, whereas Durrell’s central character is reconciled to the disorder of his Egyptian city.
These days I am very much aware of the ageing process, and I wonder whether, as I get older, I become more and more tolerant of disorder. Whereas, at one time, I identified myself quite strongly with Flora Poste’s mission, particularly in relation to my family, now I regard the disorder of life with a kind of world-weary acceptance. This doesn’t bode well for the future of my art, of course, in that it is surely the case that any art necessarily entails a kind of ordering process.
The parallel you draw between Alexandria and Cold Comfort Farm is interesting—both worlds are messy in ways that feel deliberate, almost protective. Durrell’s tangle of relationships and moods is exactly what makes me want to revisit it every few years too.