Hemlock and After is a 1952 novel by British writer Angus Wilson; it was his first published novel after a series of short stories. The novel offers a candid portrayal of gay life in post-World War II England.
Plot introduction
Bernard Sands, a prominent writer who has been given financial aid to start a writer's colony at Vardon Hall, faces a failing marriage, attempts to come to grips with his homosexuality and lives next door to a procuress for paedophiles.
Characters in Hemlock and After Bernard Sands, the protagonist; a homosexual Ella, Bernard's wife Elizabeth, the Sandses' daughter James, the Sandses' son Charles, a friend of Bernard; a senior civil servant Mrs Curry, the Sands's neighbour; a procuress for pedophiles Hubert Rose, an architect and a pedophile
References to other works Angus Wilson said in an interview that the ending of the novel was Dickensian.Michael Millgate, "Angus Wilson, The Art of Fiction No. 20", The Paris Review, Autumn-Winter 1957, No. 17.
Trivia The novel was written in only four weeks.
References
External links Review from Time Magazine, 29 September 1952.