''Famous Last Words'' is a 1981 novel by Canadian author

Timothy Findley Timothy Irving Frederick Findley, (October 30, 1930 – June 20, 2002) was a Canadian novelist and playwright.

, in which Hugh Selwyn Mauberley (originally from the

Ezra Pound Ezra Weston Loomis Pound (30 October 1885 – 1 November 1972) was an List of poets from the United States, American poet and critic, a major figure in the early modernist poetry movement, and a Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Ita ...

poem of the same name) is the main character. In the book Findley poses a few ideas involving the flight of

Rudolf Hess Rudolf Walter Richard Hess (Heß in German; 26 April 1894 – 17 August 1987) was a German politician, Nuremberg trials, convicted war criminal and a leading member of the Nazi Party in Nazi Germany, Germany. Appointed Deputy Führer ( ...

into

Scotland Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...

Reception

Christopher Lehmann-Haupt Christopher Lehmann-Haupt (June 14, 1934 – November 7, 2018) was an American journalist, editor of ''The New York Times Book Review'', critic, and novelist, based in New York City. He served as senior Daily Book Reviewer from 1969 to 1995. Bi ...

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

wrote that " his remarkable new novel," Findley "has mixed fact and fiction, actual people and invented ones, to produce a new and bizarre form of historical romance. Similar in mood to D.M. Thomas's '' The White Hotel'' and almost as boldly imagined, ''Famous Last Words'' reflects on the catastrophe that is 20th-century history and raises further doubts about the possibility of surviving it." In '' The Boston Phoenix'', John Domini felt that the novel was "overwritten in places and overindulgent of its idols; yet in its creation of Mauberley, and its investigation of that sensitive man’s entrapment in evil, ''Famous Last Words'' carries forward essential work. It makes eloquent what had previously been numbed, accusatory, and silent."

References

1981 Canadian novels Novels by Timothy Findley Clarke, Irwin & Company books Ezra Pound {{Canada-novel-stub