Malcolm Lowry’s reputation as a novelist rests primarily on the masterpiece
Under the Volcano
. Lowry is also well known for what he did not write; that is, for his anguished inability to complete his works.
is one of only two novels published in Lowry’s lifetime; the bulk of his writings were still in various stages of composition when he died in 1957. In
Forests of Symbols
, Patrick A. McCarthy addresses the central enigma of the writer’s life: his dependence on writing for his sense of identity and his fear that the process of composition would leave him with no identity apart from his work.