The Illuminated Man

In Christopher Priest’s recent collection of essays and memoirs The Recollections (reviewed here last month), it became clear that J.G. Ballard had been something of a lodestar for Priest’s early career, and in fact the last major book he was working on when he died in February of 2024 was a biography, now completed by Nina Allan as The Illuminated Man: Life, Death and the Worlds of J. G. Ballard. There is, to be sure, no shortage of works about Ballard, including an earlier biography by John Baxter and a 2008 autobiography, Miracles of Life: Shanghai to Shepperton. But, as its subtitle implies, The Illumi­nated Man (a title borrowed from an early Ballard story) is far more than a biography, and about far more than Ballard. It is, instead, a kind of madrigal for three voices, at times painfully moving, and it weaves together three narratives, each from a writer known for unconventional tales that loop and fold into themselves. First, of course, is Ballard himself, whose voice emerges through meticulous research (three bibliographies and over 500 footnotes!) and a careful reading of his fiction, memoirs, interviews, and essays. Priest’s voice also comes across clearly, as he often shifts into first-person narration as he grapples with the inevitable challenges of sorting out fact from legend and details his own experiences involving Ballard. Finally, Nina Allan not only de­scribes her own research in completing the book, but tells in deeply personal terms of the struggles faced by the dying Priest in trying valiantly to complete his final work.