A fragment of life

Description

The narrative work of the Welsh writer Arthur Machen (1863-1947) revolves around the feeling that beneath the appearances of things beats a powerful and immense invisible world. If in his stories of supernatural horror he masterfully takes us into an everyday world threatened by unexpected and evil forces, the fantastic quality of A Piece of Life, first published in 1906 and forgotten afterwards, gravitates around the gradual and prodigious change of consciousness of the protagonist and his new perception of the surrounding world. The emergence of mysterious elements in Darnell's daily life, crushed by routine and precariousness, leads to the experience of its protagonist with a reality crossed by symbols. A fragment of life is above all about the discovery of our ancestors and their secrets, of the need to transcend individual identity and reestablish contact with the gods. In all these questions we can suspect the intimate aspirations of that solitary and anonymous writer who was Arthur Machen at that time..