Jason Elliot

The Madhouse Jason Elliot

'We could not, in that place, just lead peaceful and uncomplicated lives, ignoring the fact of our longing. To ignore it, to pretend, to divert ourselves with a thousand trivialities - this would be worse than death itself.'

Unfolding before the reader like a richly-woven oriental tapestry, The Madhouse is a unique, luminous tale of spiritual adventure, studded with gems of psychological insight and timeless wisdom.

An anonymous manuscript tells the story of a man - we never know his name - made captive in a mysterious house. Its inhabitants are strangely familiar, its limits unknown. Driven by a longing to escape and to find meaning in his surroundings, the protagonist's journey moves compellingly towards an uncertain but irresistible goal: freedom. But the challenge is greater than at first supposed, and he must first suffer the trials, forged in the crucible of self-discovery, of separation, failure and betrayal - as well as fathom the paradoxes of time, love and death.

A sustained allegory of inner quest, delivered in a voice at times philosophical and introspective, at others irreverent and provocative, this enigmatic tale fearlessly explores the metaphysical conundrums of life - alongside the perennial challenges of self-discovery, purpose and meaning.

Readers of Borges, Kafka, and Herman Hesse will recognise in The Madhouse a bold and powerful synthesis of intellectual and spiritual enquiry, fused in allegorical language at the highest level of didactic literary fiction.