The urge to escape is probably as universal, and as intellectually inexplicable, as the urge to procreate. Even the richest, the most beloved, the most successful, the most powerful must occasionally long to get away from their lives. It’s not really glamour or adventure one wants; it’s anonymity. Driving through the further reaches of Queens, for example, or the Bronx, it often strikes me temptingly that I could change my name, rent one of these identical little houses or rooms, and disappear forever. What do we want to run away from? Habit; routine; soul-deadening daily tasks; obligatory but meaningless social engagements; mind-rotting small talk; the tyranny of family; the arbitrary jollity of holidays; the exhausting responsibilities of love itself.

It is not a subject that is treated often in fiction. One who has done it brilliantly is Sylvia Townsend Warner, the British writer who died in 1978 and was the author of seven novels ...

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