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Authors: Andrew Wilson
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banks and money, business, crime and safety… drugs… health and hospitals…internet and email. I worked out which of the internet cafés was nearest, found its location on the map and started to walk as quickly as I could. After the claustrophobia of being stuck inside Crace’s palazzo with only a wizened old man for company, I found walking through the crowds intensely enjoyable and liberating. I smiled at a couple of Italian shop girls as they walked by and even turned around to watch them strut down the street. I caught a whiff of coffee as I strode by a bar, and even though it was only 9:30 and I had plenty of time, I had to fight the urge to sit down at a table and just watch the world go by.
A few minutes later I found the street, past a bank, a fruit shop, two pasticcerias and another bar. I walked back up again. I began to panic. There was no sign of it. It must be here. I would simply have to ask. I walked into the bar. Five or six men stood at the marble counter enjoying their morning wine—un’ombra, “a shade,” Venetians called a glass of wine, because traditionally wine used to be stored in parts of the city that were not exposed to the sun; the digging of cellars, of course, was completely out of the question.
I bought a bottle of water and asked the barman—a man with a leathery, contour-lined face—about the location of the Network House.
“It’s next to the bank, down some stairs,” he said. “But it’s closed.”
“What time does it open?”
He puffed on a cigarette.
“It will not open,” he said. “Closed for good.”
“Are you sure?”
He inhaled again, as if that was answer enough, and turned away.
I retrieved my map from my bag and found another internet café—a twenty minutes’ walk away. I checked my watch. I would not have as much time as I had hoped, but it wouldn’t take me long to do the shopping. I downed my water, left some coins on the counter and walked toward Dorsoduro. As I snaked my way across the city, over the Accademia bridge and through the narrow calles, I tried to enjoy the two hours out of captivity. But with each snatched glimpse of a yet another church that housed spectacular art, I felt increasingly resentful and angry.
I arrived at the internet café feeling like I had bathed in a warm, sticky liquid. The physical relief on entering the air-conditioned space was immense, but I knew I hadn’t time to relax. I went to the reception desk, where I was assigned a computer, logged on and typed in the address of a search engine. I entered Crace’s name. Over five thousand hits. Why hadn’t I heard much about him before? I clicked on the first entry on the list.
The potted synopsis of his life told me that he had been born in 1931 in Edinburgh, where his father worked as a science master at a public school. He went to Oxford in 1949, where he read English, and graduated in 1952. Crace decided to follow his father into teaching and took a job at a little known fee-paying school in Dorset. It was while he was a teacher that he wrote his first novel, The Debating Society, published in 1962. “A clever conceit that rises above the drive for mere novelty, The Debating Society un-masks the pretence of our so-called modern civilised society to reveal the darkness lurking beneath,” was how a critic from the Times had described it. I wondered how the teachers and the parents of the boys at Crace’s school had reacted to one of the masters writing such a novel. The report also said the book, to date, had sold over three million copies. But although there were reports that Crace was at work on another novel, he never published anything else. In 1967 he told a journalist, “I am giving up writing because I have nothing relevant left to say. I have enjoyed enormous success with my first novel, and I thank all my readers for their support and encouragement. However, I am sure they would not thank me if I carried on publishing. Why spoil such a perfect,
A few minutes later I found the street, past a bank, a fruit shop, two pasticcerias and another bar. I walked back up again. I began to panic. There was no sign of it. It must be here. I would simply have to ask. I walked into the bar. Five or six men stood at the marble counter enjoying their morning wine—un’ombra, “a shade,” Venetians called a glass of wine, because traditionally wine used to be stored in parts of the city that were not exposed to the sun; the digging of cellars, of course, was completely out of the question.
I bought a bottle of water and asked the barman—a man with a leathery, contour-lined face—about the location of the Network House.
“It’s next to the bank, down some stairs,” he said. “But it’s closed.”
“What time does it open?”
He puffed on a cigarette.
“It will not open,” he said. “Closed for good.”
“Are you sure?”
He inhaled again, as if that was answer enough, and turned away.
I retrieved my map from my bag and found another internet café—a twenty minutes’ walk away. I checked my watch. I would not have as much time as I had hoped, but it wouldn’t take me long to do the shopping. I downed my water, left some coins on the counter and walked toward Dorsoduro. As I snaked my way across the city, over the Accademia bridge and through the narrow calles, I tried to enjoy the two hours out of captivity. But with each snatched glimpse of a yet another church that housed spectacular art, I felt increasingly resentful and angry.
I arrived at the internet café feeling like I had bathed in a warm, sticky liquid. The physical relief on entering the air-conditioned space was immense, but I knew I hadn’t time to relax. I went to the reception desk, where I was assigned a computer, logged on and typed in the address of a search engine. I entered Crace’s name. Over five thousand hits. Why hadn’t I heard much about him before? I clicked on the first entry on the list.
The potted synopsis of his life told me that he had been born in 1931 in Edinburgh, where his father worked as a science master at a public school. He went to Oxford in 1949, where he read English, and graduated in 1952. Crace decided to follow his father into teaching and took a job at a little known fee-paying school in Dorset. It was while he was a teacher that he wrote his first novel, The Debating Society, published in 1962. “A clever conceit that rises above the drive for mere novelty, The Debating Society un-masks the pretence of our so-called modern civilised society to reveal the darkness lurking beneath,” was how a critic from the Times had described it. I wondered how the teachers and the parents of the boys at Crace’s school had reacted to one of the masters writing such a novel. The report also said the book, to date, had sold over three million copies. But although there were reports that Crace was at work on another novel, he never published anything else. In 1967 he told a journalist, “I am giving up writing because I have nothing relevant left to say. I have enjoyed enormous success with my first novel, and I thank all my readers for their support and encouragement. However, I am sure they would not thank me if I carried on publishing. Why spoil such a perfect,
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