Tragedy of the Korosko, The

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Authors : Arthur Conan Doyle Foreword Writer: Tony Robinson Translator: - Editor: - Series: Hesperus Classics Publication Date: March 2003 ISBN 13: 9781843910398 ISBN 10: 184391039X Page Extent: 126 Price: £ 6.99

Overview:

A disparate group of Western tourists collect aboard the Nile steamer Korosko, anticipating a trip filled with sightseeing and civilised colonial pleasures. But when, during a morning excursion in the desert, they are kidnapped by a group of dervish camel-men, their relationships, their beliefs and their very survival are placed in jeopardy.

In The Tragedy of The Korosko, Arthur Conan Doyle evokes the uncertainty of the late-Victorian era, a time of white supremacy and cultural hegemony, but also a time at which the moral authority of Western imperialist powers was starting to be called into question. Each of Conan Doyle's carefully drawn characters plays their part in the cultural and spiritual debate that underlies the story, and each emerges with a greater understanding, be it personal or universal, at the close.

Written in 1898, and permeated with sharp humour, this high melodrama intertwines Conan Doyle's dual interests: global responsibility and quest for spiritual truth.

Additional information:

About the foreword writer:
Actor, presenter and writer Tony Robinson is one of the best-known faces on British television. He has also recorded a host of audiobooks including the Just So Stories and Terry Pratchett's Discworld series.

...the little steamer lay silent, dark and motionless in the shadow of the high Halfa bank. And beyond this one point of civilisation and of comfort there lay the limitless, savage, unchangeable desert, straw-coloured and dreamlike in the moonlight, mottled over with the black shadows of the hills.

'...this is an exciting story, admirably told, celebrating qualities which are out of fashion rather than out of date.'

— The Tablet