Criticism > Contemporary Literary Criticism > Unsworth, Barry - John Clute (review date 16 August 1985)

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John Clute (review date 16 August 1985)

SOURCE: "Death in Venice," in New Statesman, Vol. 110, No. 2839, August 16, 1985, p. 28.

[In the following review, Clute finds the meaning of Stone Virgin somewhat confusing but appreciates Unsworth's depiction of Venice.]

Bulging like a teardrop into its poisonous lagoon, Venice boasts a geography so graspable for purposes of art that it comes as a surprise not that so many stories are set there, but so few. In its fatal intercourse with the sea, the city models an inherent tendency of the Western mind to see the world as a series of dire consequences: the old familiar marriages of love and death, art and decay, power and corruption, sex and drowning.

Stone Virgin, a tale of love and death, art and decay, power and corruption and sex and drowning, has been set by Barry Unsworth, who is a deft and canny teller of tales, in the best place possible to add depth and a sense of the...

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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