THE FOLIO SOCIETY

'One of the great modern novelists'
MALCOLM BRADBURY

Robertson Davies is one of the foremost Canadian writers of the twentieth century. His fiction embodies a nation, garnering accolades and admirers amongst readers of all types and ages. The breadth of his appeal is seen in the honours he received: the Stephen Leacock Medal for humour, the Lorne Pierce Medal and 23 honorary degrees. The second book in his renowned Deptford Trilogy won the highest literary accolade in Canada - a Governor General's Award.

Deptford is a fictional, small town in rural Canada, based on Davies's own childhood home of Thamesville, Ontario. Narrow-minded attitudes and religious hypocrisy mingle with a kindness which never lets a neighbour go hungry or suffer illness alone. At the centre of this tight-knit community are three boys: Dunstan Ramsay, his 'lifelong friend and enemy' Boy Staunton and Paul Dempster. Their three lives are entwined from the moment Boy throws a stone hidden in a snowball at Dunstan who ducked, causing it to hit Mrs Dempster and so bringing about the premature birth of Paul. The three books tantalisingly play with the idea of chance, unfolding the consequences of a fleeting moment, drawing on the interplay between magic, destiny and fate. Each book is told from a different perspective and Davies's narrative skill is to interweave these radically diverse characters and strange events to create a story that leads into the heart of myth, Jungian psychoanalysis and illusion.

Such a complex, multi-layered work requires something exceptional in the way of illustrations, and in Peter Suart's inventive and subtle artworks, it has found them. Deeply immersed in the books, Suart has referenced both the imagery and stories in fascinating ways, structuring each illustration around the Tarot arcana. Each one is a pleasure to examine, filled with allusions the reader delights in spotting.