The Underside

This novel, set in Victorian London in its heyday, presents a picture, both horrific and authentic, of the 'underside' of life in the first city of the world.

It tells of Godfrey Mann, a young painter, who has access to the golden world of privilege and yet is possessed by a compelling sexual drive towards the hidden squalor and darkness below, a nostalgie de la boue that wars tumultuously both with his ideals as an artist and his love for the lion-couraged social reformer, Elizabeth. It is...