Criticism > Contemporary Literary Criticism > Unsworth, Barry - Anthony Quinn (review date 4 August 1996)

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Anthony Quinn (review date 4 August 1996)

SOURCE: "Creepy Crawling, Heavy Breathing," in New York Times Book Review, August 4, 1996, p. 12.

[In the following review, Quinn offers praise for the reprint edition of The Hide.]

Better known for his potent fictional reconstructions of time past—most memorably the slave trade epic Sacred Hunger, which shared the Booker Prize in 1992—Barry Unsworth reveals in this early novel, first published in Britain in 1970, an equally assured grasp of the modern world. Bristling with menace, The Hide is a superbly modulated study of the blighting of an innocent. While the canvas is somewhat narrower than one might expect from Mr. Unsworth, the texture of the prose is easily recognizable. And it is as dense and dark as the overgrown estate that furnishes the novel's setting.

The Hide is laid out as a dual narrative. Simon, who speaks to us in half the chapters, is a creature...

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1. Introduction
2. Principal Works
3. Criticism
   1. Anatole Broyard (review date 9 October 1977)
   2. Michael Malone (review date 11 January 1981)
   3. Christopher Lehmann-Haupt (review date 7 February 1983)
   4. Thomas R. Edwards (review date 13 March 1983)
   5. John Clute (review date 16 August 1985)
   6. Katha Pollitt (review date 6 April 1986)
   7. Barry Unsworth with Phil Hogan (interview date 18 October 1992)
   8. Herbert Mitgang (review date 23 December 1992)
   9. Sybil S. Steinberg (review date 21 August 1995)
   10. Janet Burroway (review date 12 November 1995)
   11. Charles Nicholl (review date 12 November 1995)
   12. Adam Begley (review date 24 December 1995)
   13. Richard Bernstein (review date 17 January 1996)
   14. Anthony Quinn (review date 4 August 1996)
   15. Richard Eder (review date 9 March 1997)
   16. Hilary Mantel (review date 9 March 1997)
   17. Miranda Schwartz (review date 9 March 1997)
   18. Patricia Lothrop-Green (review date September 1997)
4. Further Reading
5. Copyright