The four novels of The Alexandria Quartet – Justine (1957), Balthazar (1958), Mountolive (1958), and Clea (1960) – appeared in rapid succession in Britain and the United States, exciting critical acclaim and enjoying popular success. Lawrence Durrell had been known to a small readership for his poetry, his experimental (and banned) novel The Black Book (1938), and his travel memoirs Prospero's Cell (1945) and Reflections on a Marine Venus (1953). Now, in four substantial volumes, he seemed to have marshalled his resources and staked a claim to both literary greatness and bestsellerdom. Whatever the merits of the works his contemporaries were producing in the 1950s, most of those seemed cautious and provincial compared to Durrell's unabashedly romantic and experimental novels.
Durrell had been driven by the advance of war from Greece to Egypt in...
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Citation: Koger, Grove. "The Alexandria Quartet". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 16 October 2002 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=10820, accessed 06 December 2025.]
