Output details

The hidden

In the tradition of Le Grand Meaulnes and Great Expectations, this is a novel about the outsider, the desire to belong, and the disillusionment of acceptance: it is also a study of terror. The structure of the novel, using contemporary locations (Oxford, Athens) and the ancient site of Sparta, and juxtaposing narrative with expository 'notes'. is key to its exploration of the role of terror in a failing society and its impact on the individual. The extremism of a classical civilisation (Sparta) is used as an example of and parallel for contemporary political developments, and this strategy was recognised by commentators after publication. In The Observer, the author Kamila Shamsie called The Hidden 'A meditation on loss, guilt, obsession...one of the finest novels written so far about this, our age of terror. Hill doesn't write about al-Qaida v America or Islam v the west, but about something altogether subtler and more profound - extremism itself.' In America, the New York Times noted that 'The novel's ideas are explored with stylish rigor and a rare boldness made all the more powerful by its surprising lyricism.' These positive responses to the novel highlight how the approach adopted in the text, to explore the contemporary concern with extremism through the thriller genre and to use that to generate the climactic tensions in the narrative, produce a new perspective on the global tensions that define our current world.