Death of the Author

The death of the Polish-born British novelist Joseph Conrad is the central event of David Miller’s debut novel.

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Ross Clark

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The death of the Polish-born British novelist Joseph Conrad is the central event of David Miller’s debut novel. A reimagining of Conrad’s final days, Today explores the nature of bereavement. Within the novel’s confines, Conrad exists simply as a character — a dying man whose profession has been that of a writer and whose working life has necessitated the presence of a secretary, Lillian Hallowes, who, up to a point, offers the reader a commentary on the novel’s happenings. Miller attempts no assessment of Conrad’s work, his literary status or psychology. In this, Today resembles a television drama: it exploits verifiable events as a backdrop to universal human responses, namely those of Conrad’s friends, colleagues and family to his death.