[The Adventures of Una Persson …] is all resonance: like the whole 'Jerry Cornelius' sequence of novels and stories, it is an attempt at portraiture of the twentieth century in its essence. An ambitious project: and all Mr Moorcock's previous attempts have been dreadfully flawed. But in the light of this novel they can be seen as necessary preliminaries: here, he at last succeeds—not, of course, in totalising the twentieth century; but in showing us a great deal that we already know in our bones, but have perhaps not yet articulated, about where and when 'here and now' is.

Mr Moorcock's great gift is for synthesis. He has a strong sense of the cultural moment, the coherence and intelligibility of fashion, music, literature, politics, and every other human activity. Often his representations of such synchronicities have been forced, over-experimental. The effort has been too visible for harmony; and harmony is essential. In The Adventures of Una Persson … there is a new relaxation to Mr Moorcock's writing: he can afford the time to take care over its fine texture, and the time to feel for his characters, and to give them feelings.

There is a lot of time to play with, in fact. Mr Moorcock's highly effective way of looking at here and now is to look everywhere else. His characters are time travellers, who can move not only forward and back (though temporal inertia keeps them pretty much to this century) but also sideways, into alternative histories. One might describe the whole thing as a dramatic extension of mood décor. Instead of just altering the thematic era of one's decorating to suit a mood, one can actually travel there, and stay until one's mood shifts. Like most people with such exaggerated resources, Una and Catherine are looking for something worth doing. They try activist manipulation of history and hedonist retirement by turns; trapped always in the ambiguity of (partial) omniscience without omnipotence. Understanding a problem does not always imply solving it; and it is increasingly clear that the twentieth century is one big problem. Mr Moorcock knows no more than the next person about solutions; but his new book is, finally, that elegant, informative and enjoyable statement of the problem which he has for so long failed to achieve. (p. 22)