Thomas M. Disch

From the jacket of "The Preist: A Gothic Romance --

Thomas Disch is the author of eleven previous novels, including such classic works of science fiction as Camp Concentration, 334, and On Wings of Song, five short story collections, and six volumes of poetry, most recently Dark Verses and Light. his one-act play, The Cardinal Detoxes, has been viforously protested by the Catholic Church. He reviews theater for the New York Daily news.

Disch is an extremely versatile writer, as you can see from his bibliograpy. He writes for The Nation and Poetry Review regularly, and several other publications more occasionally. He also wrote the pilot for the late-60's television series The Prisoner. His writing is incredibly intelligent and prosaic. He has an amazing range of knowledge that he pulls from almost ceasingly, successfully melding high art with common concepts of daily life.

The first book of his I ever read was a short, strange book of 48 pages called The Silver Pillow. The inside flap reads, "the story of two symbiotic psyches at war..." I just liked the picture on the back of a beefy, bearded guy with tattooed forearms crossed in front of him. After I read the book, I started seaching out more of his work and found several novels almost immediately. First was On Wings of Song, which was more of regular Science Fiction story. Then I read Camp Concentration. Not a long book, not hard to comprehend, but one which challenged me again and again with concepts and references to obscure philosophy and religious practices; it became my favorite of his work. I was hooked.

My absolute favorite line he's ever written is in the short story Getting Into Death (from the collection of short stories by the same name,) about a dying writer who reveals to her stepdaughter the contents of her will, he says, "Had the Christmas tree in Rockefeller Center collapsed on her, Laurie could not have been crushed by any larger happiness."

Brilliant.