Down in the City : Text Classics - Elizabeth Harrower

Down in the City

Text Classics

By: Elizabeth Harrower, Delia Falconer (Introduction by)

eBook | 23 October 2013 | Edition Number 1

At a Glance

eBook


RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%OFF

or 4 interest-free payments of $3.25 with

Instant Digital Delivery to your Booktopia Reader App

Esther Prescott has seen little of life outside her wealthy family's Rose Bay mansion, until flashy Stan Peterson comes roaring up the drive in his huge American car and barges into her life. Within a fortnight they are living in his Kings Cross flat.

Moody and erratic, proud of his well-bred wife yet bitterly resentful of her privilege, Stan is involved with his former girlfriend and a series of shady business deals. Esther, innocent and desperate to please him, must endure his controlling ways.

This story of a troubled and obsessive marriage, set against the backdrop of postwar Sydney, is devastating. First published in 1957, Down in the City announced Elizabeth Harrower as a major Australian writer.

Elizabeth Harrower was born in Sydney in 1928 and moved to London in 1951. She travelled extensively and began to write fiction. Her first novel Down in the City was published in 1957, and was followed by The Long Prospect a year later. In 1959 she returned to Sydney where she began working for the ABC and as a book reviewer for the Sydney Morning Herald. In 1960 she published The Catherine Wheel, the story of an Australian law student in London, her only novel not set in Sydney.

The Watch Tower appeared in 1966. No further novels were published until May 2014 when Harrower's 'lost' novel, In Certain Circles, was released. Her work is austere, intelligent, ruthless in its perceptions about men and women. She was admired by many of her contemporaries, including Patrick White and Christina Stead, and is without doubt among the most important writers of the postwar period in Australia.

Elizabeth Harrower died in Sydney on 7 July 2020 at the age of ninety-two.

'Down in the City marked the arrival of one of the sharpest authors of psychological fiction in Australian literature. Many of the things that happen in the novel are unpleasant, but are rendered with such intensity and psychological insight that the experience of reading about them is thrilling.' Australian

'a triumph from Text's project to recover forgotten Australian literature. Doused in melancholy and written from an accessible yet unnerving third-person perspective, Harrower's debut is a light read with weighty resonance.' Readings Bookshop

on

Text Classics in eBook

Hills End : Text Classics - Ivan Southall

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
The Watcher in the Garden : Text Classics - Joan Phipson

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
I Own the Racecourse! : Text Classics - Patricia Wrightson

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
They Found a Cave : Text Classics - Nan Chauncy

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
The Odd Angry Shot : Text Classics - William Nagle

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
The Idea of Perfection : Text Classics - Kate Grenville

eBOOK

RRP $16.36

$13.99

14%
OFF
The Dying Trade : Cliff Hardy : Book 1 - Peter Corris

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
They're A Weird Mob : Text Classics - Nino Culotta

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
A Difficult Young Man : Text Classics - Martin Boyd

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
Wake In Fright : Text Classics - Kenneth Cook

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
Cosmo Cosmolino : Text Classics - Helen Garner

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
Dark Places : Text Classics - Kate Grenville

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
The Mystery Of A Hansom Cab : Text Classics - Fergus Hume

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
Bring Larks And Heroes : Text Classics - Thomas Keneally

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
Careful, He Might Hear You : Text Classics - Sumner Locke Elliot

eBOOK

RRP $25.08

$21.99

12%
OFF
Stiff : Text Classics - Shane Maloney

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
The Plains : Text Classics - Gerald Murnane

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
The Fortunes Of Richard Mahony : Text Classics - Henry Handel Richardson

eBOOK

The Women In Black : Text Classics - Madeleine St John

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
An Iron Rose : Text Classics - Peter Temple

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
1788 : Text Classics - Watkin Tench

eBOOK

Text Classics Collection on eBook

Hills End : Text Classics - Ivan Southall

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
The Watcher in the Garden : Text Classics - Joan Phipson

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
I Own the Racecourse! : Text Classics - Patricia Wrightson

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
They Found a Cave : Text Classics - Nan Chauncy

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
The Odd Angry Shot : Text Classics - William Nagle

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
The Dying Trade : Cliff Hardy : Book 1 - Peter Corris

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
They're A Weird Mob : Text Classics - Nino Culotta

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
A Difficult Young Man : Text Classics - Martin Boyd

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
Wake In Fright : Text Classics - Kenneth Cook

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
Cosmo Cosmolino : Text Classics - Helen Garner

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
Dark Places : Text Classics - Kate Grenville

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
The Mystery Of A Hansom Cab : Text Classics - Fergus Hume

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
Bring Larks And Heroes : Text Classics - Thomas Keneally

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
Careful, He Might Hear You : Text Classics - Sumner Locke Elliot

eBOOK

RRP $25.08

$21.99

12%
OFF
Stiff : Text Classics - Shane Maloney

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
The Plains : Text Classics - Gerald Murnane

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
The Fortunes Of Richard Mahony : Text Classics - Henry Handel Richardson

eBOOK

The Women In Black : Text Classics - Madeleine St John

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
An Iron Rose : Text Classics - Peter Temple

eBOOK

RRP $14.95

$12.99

13%
OFF
1788 : Text Classics - Watkin Tench

eBOOK