[ilds] Durrell's Egyptological Sources

[Bruce Redwine]

Thanks, James.  Ian came to my rescue and confirmed what I suspected.  Where did you get "Lover of Anubis?"  Lover of Death?  I was unaware of that one.

Bruce 

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> On Oct 1, 2014, at 10:28 PM, James Gifford <james.d.gifford at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> I can't help much with this, Bruce, except to say Durrell and Stephanides met and dined with George Andrew Reisner in Egypt near the pyramids.  Stephanides recounts it, so it should be tolerably accurate...
> 
> It's probably worth noting the the working titles "Lover Anubis" and "Book of the Dead" (ambiguously Egyptian or Tibetan depending on when he used the title) predate Durrell's arrival in Egypt, so he was reading to some degree prior to this.  The mummy scene in /Panic Spring/ indicates some degree of his interests as well.
> 
> Does that help?
> 
> Best,
> James
> 
>> On 2014-09-26 2:50 PM, Bruce Redwine wrote:
>> What were Durrell's Egyptological sources for /The Alexandria Quartet?/
>>  I have been able to identify only one — Anthony De Cosson's /Mareotis/
>> (1935) — which is a highly, highly superficial account.  Did Durrell
>> have access to any of the standard, scholarly histories, e.g., Flinders
>> Petrie's /History of Egypt/ (1894, 1896), J. H. Breasted's/ History of
>> Egypt/ (1909),  John A. Wilson's /Burden of Egypt/ (1951), or any others
>> of a popular kind.  I assume these books would have been in his library,
>> now in Paris.  Yes, Egyptology does not play a major role in the
>> /Quartet,/ but there are some references that suggest Durrell knew
>> somethings about the subject.  According to Ian MacNiven in his
>> biography, the Egyptian Museum in Cairo was closed during the war, so
>> Durrell wouldn't have had access to the largest single collection of
>> ancient Egyptian materials
>> 
>> Many thanks for any assistance,
>> 
>> Bruce
>> 
>> 
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