Titus Groan
Play sample
  • Published: 5 February 1998
  • ISBN: 9780749394929
  • Imprint: Vintage Classics
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 496
  • RRP: $35.00
Categories:

Titus Groan

Formats & editions
EBook
12 Aug 2011
Audiobook
10 Mar 2016
Paperback
5 Feb 1998
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A brilliantly sustained flight of gothic imagination; the first of the bestselling Gormenghast trilogy.

'Gormenghast is, to my mind and to my taste, a perfect creation' Neil Gaiman

Welcome to the world of Gormenghast, the classic fantasy series from the imagination of Mervyn Peake

As the first novel opens, Titus, heir to Lord Sepulchrave, has just been born: he stands to inherit the miles of rambling stone and mortar that stand for Gormenghast Castle. Inside, all events are predetermined by a complex ritual, lost in history, understood only by Sourdust, Lord of the Library. There are tears and strange laughter; fierce births and deaths beneath umbrageous ceilings; dreams and violence and disenchantment contained within a labyrinth of stone.

'A gorgeous volcanic eruption... A work of extraordinary imagination' New Yorker
  • Published: 5 February 1998
  • ISBN: 9780749394929
  • Imprint: Vintage Classics
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 496
  • RRP: $35.00
Categories:

About the author

Mervyn Peake

Mervyn Peake was born in 1911 in Kuling, Central Southern China, where his father was a medical missionary. His education began in China and then continued at Eltham College in South East London, followed by the Croydon School of Art and the Royal Academy Schools. Subsequently he became an artist, married the painter Maeve Gilmore in 1937 and had three children. During the Second World War he established a reputation as a gifted book illustrator for Ride a Cock Horse (1940), The Hunting of the Snark (1941), and The Rime of The Ancient Mariner (1943). Titus Groan was published in 1946, followed in 1950 by Gormenghast. Among his other works are Shapes and Sounds (1941), Rhymes Without Reason (1944), Letters from a Lost Uncle (1948) and Mr Pye (1953). He also wrote a number of plays including The Wit to Woo (1957), which was met by critical failure. Titus Alone was published in 1959. Mervyn Peake died in 1968.

Also by Mervyn Peake

The Illustrated Gormenghast Trilogy
Titus Awakes
Mr Pye
Titus Alone
Gormenghast
The Gormenghast Trilogy
See all

Praise for Titus Groan

A gorgeous volcanic eruption... A work of extraordinary imagination

New Yorker

Mr Peake's first novel holds one with its glittering eye - It has a genuine plot in the strictest sense, and it persuades you to read on simply in order to know what will happen - its gallery of characters is wonderful

Nation

The Gormenghast Trilogy is one of the most important works of the imagination to come out of [this] age

Anthony Burgess, Spectator

[An] extraordinary story bursting with grotesque characters, madness and mayhem. Fantasy writers of today owe his wild imagination a massive debt

Mail on Sunday