{"product_id":"electric-spark-the-enigma-of-dame-muriel-9781250448170","title":"Electric Spark: The Enigma of Dame Muriel","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eFinalist for the PEN\/Jacqueline Bograd Weld Award for Biography\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eShort-listed for the Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-Fiction\u003c\/b\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cb\u003eThe award-winning biographer Frances Wilson presents an exhilarating new look at Muriel Spark, a consummate artist of the twentieth century.\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"Is the story fact? Is it fiction? It is what it is,\" said Muriel Spark. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eMuriel Spark was a puzzle, and so too are her books. She dealt in word games, tricks, and ciphers; her life was composed of weird accidents, strange coincidences, and spooky events. Evelyn Waugh thought she was a saint, Bernard Levin said she was a witch, and she described herself as \"Muriel the Marvel with her X-ray eyes.\" By following the clues, riddles, and instructions Spark planted for posterity in her biographies, fiction, autobiography, and archives, Frances Wilson aims to crack her code. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ci\u003eElectric Spark\u003c\/i\u003e explores not the celebrated Dame Muriel but the apprentice mage discovering her powers. It takes us through her early years, when turmoil reigned: divorce, madness, murder, espionage, poverty, skullduggery, blackmail, love affairs, revenge, and a major religious conversion. If this sounds like a novel by Spark, it is because her experiences in the 1940s and 1950s became, alchemically distilled, the material of her art. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"As good a critic as she is a biographer [and] as sharp a stylist as she is a reader\" (\u003ci\u003eThe Boston Globe\u003c\/i\u003e), in \u003ci\u003eElectric Spark \u003c\/i\u003eFrances Wilson brings her enormous, incandescent powers to bear on one of the most formidable writers of the twentieth century.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eBinding Type:\u003c\/b\u003e Paperback\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Picador USA\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 09\/22\/2026\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN:\u003c\/b\u003e 9781250448170\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 432\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 0.74lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 8.26h x 5.42w x 1.04d","brand":"Frances Wilson","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":53241109676213,"sku":"9781250448170","price":20.4,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0473\/0804\/6492\/files\/img_39eaea63-8814-40c2-ac57-574aec3b7210.jpg?v=1788995638","url":"https:\/\/pastforward.org\/products\/electric-spark-the-enigma-of-dame-muriel-9781250448170","provider":"Past Forward","version":"1.0","type":"link"}