Concrete Island

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He has in the concrete island rediscovered the “garden surrounded by a high fence,” an untended, neglected wilderness, lacking the security of his childhood memory. But what if someone found themselves in one of the these lost zones against their will, victim of a motor accident, trapped by speeding traffic, barriers, and the semi-wild post-human landscape? None of the drivers could see him, let alone hear his dry-throated croak, and Maitland stopped, conserving his strength.

But the truck pulls off unexpectedly and Proctor becomes entangled in the ropes and is swept backwards, helplessly, into a vast concrete stanchion where his body is smashed and he is garrotted, the ropes snapping and dropping his body to the ground as the truck carries on regardless. It feels a long, long way from the trilogy of florid disaster novels in the early 1960s or from the jewelled prose of Vermilion Sands and the more lush and decadent of his many short stories, a long way from the dead astronauts and drained swimming pools of the desert resorts. All of which leads to the conclude that Ballard’s ‘concrete island’ is very much an island of the mind. Bradbury on the other hand, can sit right alongside any other book on the shelf without getting dirty looks from the other books (strained metaphor). As in all Ballard’s best work ‘Concrete Island’ provides an unnerving study of our modern lives and world.

All of Marshalls’ Concrete Traffic Islands are fully compliant with relevant Traffic Advisory Leaflets, Highway Regulations and Local Transport Notes.

When he realizes that no one sees him and help is not forthcoming we are treated to the minutiae of survival. Maitland makes a crutch and hobbles around the grassy space and makes a discovery – there is no other way off this patch of abandoned waste land: he is trapped on this ‘island’. Time becomes abstract -meaningless, orientation imperceptible, deliverance is so close but so distant. Conflicts ensue with the other inhabitants and before long Maitland is struggling to determine whether he was truly meant to leave the island at all.It will be interesting to see if the current Lockdown provides inspiration for similarly visionary writing in the future. In June 2013, BBC Radio 4 aired an hour-long adaptation by Graham White, directed by Mary Peate, featuring Andrew Scott as Maitland, Georgia Groome as Jane and Ben Crowe as Proctor. After suffering an injury to his leg he cannot climb the steep slopes hemming him in and finds himself trapped (interestingly King's story sees his protagonist hobbled too, with a shattered ankle, although his injury leads him in a very different direction to Maitland).

For all ebook purchases, you will be prompted to create an account or login with your existing HarperCollins username and password.still visible, one small 1/4" color chip out of top edge of jacket spine, jacket now protected in a Brodart. In fact, the whole city was now asleep, part of an immense unconscious Europe, while he himself crawled about on a forgotten traffic island like the nightmare of this slumbering continent.

Badly injured in a subsequent escape attempt, first comes self-pity, a bottle of Burgundy from the wrecked Jag, an exhausted sleep; then, next morning, his bid for survival begins: water, food, shelter, a signal-fire, rescue. A thorough grasp of the topography of the island seemed imperative, and after several re-reads I’d got it and was able to easily orient myself to the island in the course of Maitland’s perambulations. This edition is part of a new commemorative series of Ballard's works, featuring introductions from a number of his admirers (including Zadie Smith, Adam Philips, Adam Thirlwell and Robert Macfarlane) and brand-new cover designs from the artist Stanley Donwood. Is he perhaps using his injuries as an excuse for not trying harder to escape, in a sense choosing to remain – a rejection of the outside world?What makes the novel more than a simple modern adaptation of Robinson Crusoeis the relationship between Robert Maitland and the highway, the very object that meant to facilitate his high-efficiency existence and that ended up rejecting him. He gestured towards them, trying to make a circuit of the island so that he could leave these sections of himself where they belonged. We follow Maitland in this struggle and watch as his desire to escape is tested, and his motivations in general come into question. A commitment that is evidenced by the power play and consummated behind the charade of a cash transaction demanded and afterwards recinded by Jane.