SOURCE: Durix, Jean-Pierre. “Through Tension to Metamorphosis: The Angel at the Gate by Wilson Harris.” World Literature Written in English 24, no. 1 (summer 1984): 120–27.

In the following essay, Durix discusses the automatic writing and multi-layered narrative construction in The Angel at the Gate, describing the narrative as “a dream journey.”

The Angel at the Gate by Wilson Harris starts with a liminary note signed “W. H.” explaining that the plot of the novel is a transcription of Mary Stella Holiday's automatic writing, which took place while she was undergoing treatment and receiving guidance from Father Joseph Marsden, a priest-cum-hypnotist living at Angel Inn, an old house in London. The narrative arises out of Mary's malaise and her desire to situate herself in relation to others. This specific form, a narrative within a work of fiction, is not new in Harris' corpus: he has used this model in The Eye of...