Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Mountolive
    Mountolive
    Mountolive
    Audiobook (abridged)3 hours

    Mountolive

    Written by Lawrence Durrell

    Narrated by Nigel Anthony

    4/5

    ()

    Switch to ebook

    About this audiobook

    ‘With the open sesame of language ready to hand, he suddenly began to find himself really penetrating a foreign country’ In Mountolive the third volume in Durrell’s Alexandria Quartet, the events surrounding the interwoven community of Nessim, Justine, Narouz, Pursewarden and the other major characters are given a very different perspective. The intrigues and complex relationships are seen through the political prism of a world plunging towards war. David Mountolive, once emotionally involved with Nessim’s set, now returns to Egypt as the British ambassador…
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherNaxos Audiobooks
    Release dateSep 13, 1995
    ISBN9789629545871
    Author

    Lawrence Durrell

    Born in Jalandhar, British India, in 1912 to Indian-born British colonials, Lawrence Durrell was a critically hailed and beloved novelist, poet, humorist, and travel writer best known for the Alexandria Quartet novels, which were ranked by the Modern Library as among the greatest works of English literature in the twentieth century. A passionate and dedicated writer from an early age, Durrell’s prolific career also included the groundbreaking Avignon Quintet, whose first novel, Monsieur (1974), won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize, and whose third novel, Constance (1982), was nominated for the Booker Prize. He also penned the celebrated travel memoir Bitter Lemons of Cyprus (1957), which won the Duff Cooper Prize. Durrell corresponded with author Henry Miller for forty-five years, and Miller influenced much of his early work, including a provocative and controversial novel, The Black Book (1938). Durrell died in France in 1990.  

    More audiobooks from Lawrence Durrell

    Related to Mountolive

    Related audiobooks

    Classics For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Drifting Into Antiquity

      Aug 20, 2019

      Drifting Into Antiquity
      11 min read

    • Article

      Christmas In Ushuaia

      Jun 10, 2021

      All people have had ill luck, but Jairus’s daughter and Lazarus had the worst. Mark Twain Laz pulled the parka closer to his body, ineffectually trying to ward off the gelid wind that blew from the mountains. Argentina was supposed to be warm in late

      10 min read

    • Article

      Temptation

      Dec 28, 2021

      Temptation
      6 min read

    • Article

      The Island (catullus 64)

      Mar 1, 2022

      Back then the evergreens tumbled downriverfrom the glaze-white runoff to the boot-stirred puddlesof amber young men who fulfilled our destiny,who clambered into ships, on horses, and in wagonspainting the newfound landscapes ours.Our calling was nobl

      9 min read

    • Article

      Tali

      Dec 15, 2019

      Tali
      3 min read

    • Article

      Poetry In Motion

      Sep 3, 2019

      Poetry In Motion
      6 min read

    • Article

      The Power And The Passion

      Sep 19, 2021

      The Power And The Passion
      4 min read

    • Article

      Eastwards Down The Zambezi

      Feb 17, 2020

      At Algoa Bay in 1841 a young man disembarked unnoticed among the traders and immigrants. He had recently qualified as a doctor and held a diploma in divinity. He loaded an ox wagon with the few provisions his meagre missionary salary would allow and

      4 min read

    • Article

      Read A Sneak Peek of IMPOSSIBLE CREATURES

      Sep 6, 2023

      The murderer arrived by boat. He came gently, with a soft tread and beautifully clean hands. He strode past a group of men and women hauling in a catch of fire-fish, his knife out of sight in his pocket. They glanced round at him, but he only nodded

      4 min read

    • Article

      Ursula K. Le Guin

      Jun 15, 2018

      He was thinking of Lookfar, abandoned long ago, beached on the sands of Selidor. Little of her would be left by now, a plank or two down in the sand maybe, a bit of driftwood on the western sea. As he drifted near sleep he began to remember sailing t

      15 min read

    • Article

      More Things In Heaven

      Dec 10, 2021

      It’s the deep mid-winter, when sailors check their warps, settle down in lamp-lit saloons, top up their bogey stoves and pour themselves a dram. If they’re in tune with the outside world, they’ll also shut off the flickering screens, kill the music m

      5 min read

    • Article

      6 Watery Folklore Wonders

      Mar 25, 2021

      6 Watery Folklore Wonders
      5 min read

    • Article

      The Ferryman

      Oct 26, 2020

      At the end of the summer, when the high tide of tourists had gone out but autumn proper was still a few weeks away, the foot ferry still ran on the August timetable. It was always dead quiet when he made the first run over to Fowey from Polruan; even

      6 min read

    • Article

      The Slave Who Braved All For Love

      May 4, 2020

      The Wikipedia entry says it all: ‘Florence Barbara Maria Szász, an orphan who became a slave, explored the Nile and died a lady.’ If Hollywood had been around in the 19th century, her life would have made a blockbuster. Very few people who visited th

      4 min read

    • Article

      The Wimblestone

      Oct 1, 2023

      The Wimblestone
      7 min read

    • Article

      A Little Trip

      Aug 2, 2021

      As the first morning light peeked through the gap in the curtains, Alice left her new husband in bed. She wrapped her silk kimono around her; a present from Jeremy, it reminded her yet again just how generous he’d been since their wedding. Even this

      5 min read

    • Article

      A Well No One Can Reach

      Mar 15, 2022

      A Well No One Can Reach
      6 min read

    • Article

      In Memory Of Derek Alton Walcott

      Mar 15, 2018

      1 Island traffic slows to a haltas screeching gulls reluctantto lift heavenwardcongregate like mourners in saltcrustedkelp, as the repellentnews spreads to colder shores: Sir Derek is no more.Bandwidths, clogged by streamingtributes, carry the pitcho

      2 min read

    • Article

      Life In A Cornish Fishing Town

      May 28, 2020

      Life In A Cornish Fishing Town
      5 min read

    • Article

      Skein Is land

      Nov 6, 2019

      Skein Is land
      6 min read

    • Article

      Are You Lonesome Tonight?

      Aug 8, 2019

      Are You Lonesome Tonight?
      6 min read

    • Article

      Christmas in Hawaii

      Dec 7, 2023

      Christmas in Hawaii
      3 min read

    • Article

      Berber Vodka

      Sep 10, 2021

      Berber Vodka
      3 min read

    • Article

      Helpless Witnesses

      Apr 25, 2024

      Helpless Witnesses
      5 min read

    • Article

      Love In The Time Of Treason

      May 6, 2021

      Love In The Time Of Treason
      17 min read

    • Article

      In The Wake Of Shelley

      May 12, 2023

      In The Wake Of Shelley
      12 min read

    • Article

      How The World Turns A Blind Eye To African Slavery

      Oct 27, 2022

      SINCE I WAS OLD ENOUGH TO READ ABOUT Africa, I have been fascinated by the Tuareg. For more than a thousand years they were the fierce, veiled, camel-riding, sword-wielding warlords of the Sahara until they were ruthlessly conquered in the late ninet

      18 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Mountolive

    4/5

    253 ratings15 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 5/5
      See the review for Justine.
    • 4/5
      Lawrence Durrell provides a second differing improvisation on the theme of his original story in [Justine] with this third novel in the [Alexandria Quartet]. This time, Durrell looks at the affairs of Nessim and Justine and Darley through the eyes of a British embassy officer, Mountolive. Starting years before the events of [Justine] Mountolive is first introduced to the Hosnani family when he brings a letter of introduction to Nessim’s father, an influential Egyptian Copt farmer and businessman. The elder Hosnani, struck with a degenerative disease, invites the young man to stay in the Hosnani home for an extended stay. While there, Mountolive begins an affair with Nessim’s mother, Leila; the affair that will afflict him for the remainder of his life. Mountolive is eventually posted as the Ambassador to Egypt in the years leading up to World War II. He uncovers a plot by Nessim and Justine to arm Jewish disidents in Palestine. The discovery leaves Nessim and Justine broken and separated. [Mountolive] reads more like a political thriller than the previous two books. Indeed, [Justine]’s narrator, Darley, ridicules the idea that either Justine or Nessim could truly be involved in any political intrigue. The tone Durrell strikes in [Mountolive], and the credible plot he builds with the same basic characters and story, is a testament to the success of his vision in creating such independent but related narratives. Bottom Line: A third view on the events surrounding Nessim, Justine, and Darley, this time from a political angle; a brilliant counterpoint to the previous, more romantic novels. 4 bones!!!!(Qualification: Technically, I listened to this book rather than reading it – my first audiobook. The reader was very effective, and I enjoyed the experience, though I suspect the version was slightly abridged.)
    • 4/5
      The third movement of the great Quartet, one of the most underrated masterpieces of 20th century literature, consummately read by Nigel Anthony, who really brings out the haunting music in Durrell’s prose.
    • 4/5
      As we gradually realise the scope of Durrell's literary experiment, in this, the third of the Alexandria novels, it becomes clear how no one human can ever truly know any other human, and it's heartbreaking. Durrell's prose is often too rich, veering into a purple so rich Caesar wouldn't wear it, but for every shot that misses, three hit their mark. Mountolive's drive through the storm is rivaled for beauty only by the dust-storm sequence in "Justine", and the final chapter is a slow, pulsing, vivid depiction of the last moments before death. I'll probably give myself a few weeks to cleanse the palate before reading the final volume in the series, but I'm a Durrell convert for life, I can tell.
    • 4/5
      I am slowly making my way through Lawrence Durrell’s Alexandria Quartet, four books originally published 1957-1960. I still have to read Clea, but so far, Mountolive is my favorite. It is a more straightforward and linear narrative than the first two books, Justine and Balthazar. David Mountolive is a British diplomat who gets promoted and moves back to Alexandria. The storyline covers his initial life in Egypt, and his relationship with the Hosnani family, particularly Leila and her grown sons, Nessim, and Narouz. It covers Mountolive’s rise in the administrative ranks and sheds light on the nefarious events that have earlier occurred, such that the reader understands why one of the characters was murdered. After the first two installments, I have gotten used to Durrell’s elaborate writing style, and after initially not liking it all that much, I am now enjoying it. I think it helped that this third book in the series is written in third person. I do not think any of these books stands alone very well, so if you are planning to read this classic set, start with Justine.
    • 4/5
      The conflict between duty and personal relationships. Mountolive does what the second book could not: freed from Darley's narration and shifted to a third person perspective, it casts the first book in a new light rather than merely adding to its layers. It has the power to stand on its own, although anyone skipping the first two novels would cost this one its ability to surprise. Even Balthazar, it seems, was often treading in the dark. At first it reads only like the next link in a chain as Mountolive's story builds on our introduction to Nessim's family. Then as Pursewarden, Nessim and Justine receive further illumination, it folds back in on itself.At the same time as the puzzle box reveals its extra facets, however, in bringing clarity to vagueness it also brings the prosaic to the artful. Darley is largely dismissed behind his back, but for the reader to do the same would be to brush away the slick presentation that Durrell brought to his first novel and (to a lesser degree) the second. This third is more fun and easy to read, but it is also more conventional and lacks the same depth. I regret Durrell had the casual propensity of tossing the "N" word into the mix. It disturbed my easy enjoyment of what's otherwise the best entertainment value of the quartet so far, if not the most skillful.
    • 4/5
      I enjoyed this chapter of the Alexandria quartet, and can see how the layering of the narrative was successful in carrying the spirit of the overall work. Here we get a political angle to the motivations, and a showing of the steel teeth that lay not so far beneath the surface of pre-war Alexandria, and by extension, through the British Empire as a whole. It wasn't any work to press on to the next volume.
    • 5/5
      The sound of water trickling and of sponges crushing softly upon the body of his brother, seemed part of an entirely new fabric of thought and emotion.

      Sorry for any undue disclosures, but I'm attempting to keep my stride, however flailing and gurgling, towards the conclusion. A reddened, sweaty review of the Quartet is to follow.
    • 5/5
      Mountolive is the third novel in the Alexandria Quartet by Lawrence Durrell. In the first novel, Justine(1957) the narrator Darley, an Irish expatriate living and teaching in Alexandria, sets the stage for the innovative four volume work by describing his fascination with the ancient Egyptian city and his immersion into the complex social life of the Alexandrians. As a writer, he attempts to capture the essence of the city by chronicling over time the intricate and mysterious interactions of several characters living in the Mediterranean coastal city in pre-World War II Egypt. Justine is the flawed, sensual heart of her social group, married to and in love with Nessim, the eldest son of a wealthy Coptic Christian family who live on a vast ranch at the edge of the desert. As a Jew, she is forever excluded from true acceptance by Nessim's family and the culture of Alexandria. She is impulsively driven to find self -acceptance and identification with the essence of the life of the city. She searches desperately but unsuccessful to find meaning in life in Alexandria, that she conceptualizes as a small precise key to a beautiful and intricate pocket watch. The urgency is to find the key before age reduces her passion and youthful allure.The second novel, Balthazar(1958) involves Darley's review of an interlinear (a book written in more than one language) sent to him by Balthazar a psychiatrist acquaintance who presents a more detailed view from multiple cultural sources of the social and political situation in Alexandria described in Justine. Important information not earlier available is supplied and the historical accuracy of events is supplemented by Balthazar's complex written psychoanalytic interpretation of Justine, Nessim, and other key players. The personalities of the characters are shown to be less fixed and more determined by interpersonal agendas and apparently random events in Alexandria than Darley presented in volume one of the quartet. Even with the structured focus on unconscious motivations of the characters and their defensive interactions, the essence of life in Alexandria seems chaotic and random.In the third novel, Mountolive (1959), Darley describes the career and psychological development of a British diplomat trained for a lifetime to maintain "good form" at all times. Part of his training as a young man involved early placement by the British High Commission in Alexandria as a sort of scribe to await his first diplomatic posting. At that time he had a letter of introduction to the Hosnani family, the Coptic Christian family owners of the ranch Darley introduced in the first novel, Justine. The reticent Mountolive came of age rapidly in his brief early experience placement and learned the value of maintaining a careful, conservative, British approach to people and diplomatic decision-making, his "stiff upper lip." With knowledge gained from this experience, Mountolive left Alexandria for many years occupying additional upwardly mobile posts in the British Empire between the World Wars. In the third novel of the Quartet, after years of training in diplomacy and obedience, he returns to Alexandria as British Ambassador to Egypt during the same time period described in Justine and Balthazar. He anticipates that finally he can make decisions on his own and exert a British structural influence on Egyption culture, politics, and the lives of characters he met during his first visit to Alexandria.Before long, Mountolive discovers that his concentration on maintaining good form in Egypt is only as attractive as his uniform and his ambassadorial presence in society has only minor effects on social and political situations. As World War II approaches, Coptic Christians become targets of Moslem discrimination, Justine finds her risky existential key, Nissim and Balthazar organize military support for a pro-Palestinian movement, a British staff member commits suicide, the Egyptian king dies, pro-Hitler sentiment increases, and Mountolive realizes he has important responsibilities without any power to influence events. The main characters develop a common belief that somewhere in the heart of experience there is order and coherence which we might surprise them if they are attentive enough, or patient enough. But they all ask themselves, will there be time? Will Mountolive seek a path of least resistance or will he persist in his largely ceremonial ambassador role? What will happen to the Hosnani family members and other social/political ties established by Mountolive. The novel shows the restrictions on individual free will even in an exotic city like Alexandria during a turbulent historical era and sets the stage for the concluding part of the Alexandria Quartet, Clea. I highly recommend Durrell's major literary accomplishment that influenced the direction of post-World War II literature. Looking at the same events from different perspectives (Justine-existential, Balthazar-psychoanalytic, Mountoloive-social/structural) Darley constructs a narrative that establishes in the reader a tolerance for ambiguity and an acceptance of the existential power of a fully conscious life.
    • 4/5
      Starts slow and ends strangely but mostly a good and different read. Durrell's prose is a window into an earlier time of writing. Languid and descriptive w many older English words that I had to look up. Scry? The story is also a light on the perils of occupation and the difficulty in mixing western & eastern cultures. The third book in Durrell's Alexandria Quartet. Robert Kaplan noted this book in one of his travelogue's.
    • 5/5
      In this, the third volume of Durrell’s “The Alexandria Quartet,” the narrative shift focuses, this time to Mountolive, a character who has perhaps more in common with the real-life Durrell than even Darley, who narrated both volume I (“Justine”) and will narrate volume IV (“Clea”). Both Durrell and Mountolive were born in India and later joined the Foreign Service abroad.In this “sibling companion” to the other volumes, we find both more growing political intrigue and romantic machination. Just as “Balthazar” reconstituted and reframed the story of “Justine,” the entry of Mountolive as a major figure does much the same. He begins at the Hosnani estate of where Nessim, Narouz, their mother Leila, and ailing father all reside, and we quickly learn of Mountolive and Leila’s love affair. The jumps in time make it somewhat difficult to discern when this occurred (most likely well before the action of volumes I and II), but their relationship is handled every bit as well as the myriad other relationships, romantic and Plutonic, that have arisen. Mountolive takes a job as a British foreign service and hires Pursewarden, a more minor character from the previous two volumes, as one of his advisers. We also learn of a gun cartel that seems to be affiliated in some way with Narouz, whose political influence and rhetoric is becoming too strong for his own good. Mountolive’s knowledge of the gunrunning plot, along with the corruption the Pasha both accepts and participates in, let him leave Egypt, but not before becoming thoroughly disillusioned.It will come as no surprise to anyone who read my reviews of the first two novels that I have utterly enjoyed “Mountolive,” too. And since I know longer know how to gush about Durrell’s gorgeous, fantastic writing in an original way, I will do what I did in those reviews and leave you with a snippet from the opening chapter detailing Mountolive’s entry into the British Foreign Service and his involvement with Egypt:“As a junior of exceptional promise, he had been sent to Egypt for a year in order to improve his Arabic and found himself attached to the High Commission as a sort of scribe to await his first diplomatic posting; but he was already conducting himself as a young secretary of legation, fully aware of the responsibilities of future office. Only somehow today it was rather more difficult than usual to be reserved, so exciting has the fish-drive become.”How can you not love this stuff?
    • 4/5
      for me, this book doesn't quite match up with it's predecessors. it lacked some of the poetic writing from justine and balthazar. even some of the beautiful and horrific scenes were lacking. i think this is because the perspective is no longer through darley. interpreting the events through this character is what made things come alive. i am glad that durrell decided to travel back to this formula for the final installment. but it forces me to wonder, why didn't durrell keep it that way for the whole series? what was the advantage for this novel? it just made it more scientific, exact, direct, lacking the emotion.there are still some amazing sections of this book and the layer that is added is deep. i can't wait to finish the final piece.
    • 3/5
      The third book of the Alexandria quartet.Experimental fiction that was reportedly a commercial and critical success when first published, it has not aged well. Some of the stylistic quirks, such as heavily quoting the words of a fictional author in the story, just seem odd, while others are just self indulgent, such as the repeated returns to quote Scobie the gay former seaman and now police officer. Still the series is impressive in the capacity to represent the same events from the perspective of different story tellers at different times, and the while thing, in my view, is not great, but a good near miss. Read June - July 2010.
    • 4/5
      at times this novel is great, a true examation of love and desire tje reader is taken to a world and an age that gone, but in the book you see the start of our time and the end ot the older time got weaker as the novel went on
    • 4/5
      Mountolive is the third member of the Alexandria Quartet. The narrator of Justine and Balthazar (previously unnamed but now called Darley) appears as a minor character in this book, but this is a more conventional novel in structure, using a disembodied narrator and taking the British diplomat, David Mountolive as the main point-of-view character. It takes us for a third time through the events described in Justine, but shifts the emphasis to a much broader, politically-oriented view, so that the epic love story at the centre of Justine becomes a minor, background incident. Although set in the thirties, this is very clearly a novel written in the aftermath of the Suez fiasco, exploring the dangers inherent in the pro-Arab policy of the British government before the war. The early chapters set on the feudal estates of the Coptic Hosnani family have an almost Russian flavour to them (possibly deliberate, as Durrell then briefly switches the scene to the British embassy in Moscow); by the end of the book we are back in a sordid Graham-Greeneland of bribery and espionage. The odd thing about this book, perhaps, is that you could easily read it and get a great deal of pleasure out of it without knowing a thing about the two earlier books. If you are reading them in sequence, you get the additional interest of seeing the actions and motivations of the story revised and undermined yet again, with whatever that tells you about the instability of narrative authority. Possibly because Durrell isn't writing in the persona of Darley any more, there is less self-conscious overwriting, although there are still more quotable phrases per page than one is altogether comfortable with. Sadly, Scobie, the most vivid of the minor characters in the earlier books, is absent, but we still have a few scenes with Pombal, while the novelist Pursewarden really comes into his own here.