Alan Burdick is the author of
Why Time Flies: A Mostly Scientific Investigation. One of his
ten favorite books about time, as shared at the
Guardian:
The Secret Agent by Joseph Conrad
On 15 February 1894, a bomb exploded prematurely near the Greenwich Royal Observatory in London, killing the young French anarchist who carried it. Was it meant to destroy the observatory? Conrad thought so. The building housed a clock that defined Greenwich Mean Time, the standard time for the nation and, since 1884, the baseline for the entire world – as a symbol of industrialisation and government reach it would have been a tempting target. The evidence is circumstantial, but it was strong enough to fuel his 1907 novel, in which a porn-shop owner and secret government agent named Adolf Verloc is caught up in an anarchist terror plot.
Read about
another entry on the list.
The Secret Agent is among
Heinz Helle’s top ten novels featuring hateful characters,
Neel Mukherjee's top ten books about revolutionaries,
Jason Burke's five books on Islamic militancy,
Iain Sinclair's five novels on the spirit and history of London,
Dan Vyleta's top ten books in second languages,
Jessica Stern's five best books on who terrorists are,
Adam Thorpe's top ten satires, and on
John Mullan's list of ten of the best professors in literature.
--Marshal Zeringue
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