| Admin History | Written in 2000-2002 and first pubished in the United Kingdom in 2003, the novel has also been translated into Dutch (2004) and French (2006).
Moving between London and Cornwall, A Sweet Obscurity is told from the alternating viewpoints of four characters: musicologist Eliza; her estranged husband Giles, an operatic counter tenor; his girlfriend Julia; and Pearce, a Cornish farmer, as yet unconnected to any of them. Running through the four strands, is Dido, the niece Eliza adopted on her sister's death, who has discovered a terrible family secret. Frustratingly, although she is central to the narrative, the reader never hears Dido's own voice.
The novel is structured like the Elizabethan magridals it features - in four voices - soprano, alto, tenor and base. The concept of a lost magridal came to Gale in a dream and the novel's title is taken from the lyrics he dreamt, as was the original title 'Country Pleasures'. |