Described by the late poet and essayist Joseph Brodsky as "the best British author writing today," Tim Parks is as prolific a journalist, critic, and translator as he is a novelist. In Understanding Tim Parks, Gillian Fenwick explores Parkss body of work and maintains that Parks is the epitome of the modern man of letters. The novels that Parks set in his English homeland--such as Loving Roger, Home Thoughts, and Family Planning--are complex texts treading between tragedy and comedy. Fenwick asserts that Parkss heroes and heroines are real people who make readers empathize with them and their indecision.
Parkss writing crosses genres as well as international boundaries. Fenwick argues that Parkss Italian sojourn of the past twenty years has brought a richness to his work. Wanting no part of saccharine treatments of la dolce vita, Parks in Italian Neighbours and An Italian Education has described ordinary, at times frustrating, life in Italy with a touch of cynicism. Parks establishes himself as an "Englishman in Verona"--he sees his home country with an increased objectivity, but is not quite fully assimilated into his new country. At the same time, his time in Italy has allowed him a much broader, European perspective: his novels Shear and Europa, which are set on the Continent and feature characters of several European nationalities, capture his enlarged European scope.
From Parkss novels and nonfiction books to his translations and journalism, Fenwick reckons with Parkss full literary range and sheds light on the work of a versatile English writer whose international recognition is steadily growing.
