The Takeover (novel)

The Takeover

First UK edition
Author	Muriel Spark
Cover artist	Peter Goodfellow
Country	United Kingdom
Language	English
Publisher	Macmillan
Publication date	1976
Media type	Print (Hardback & Paperback)
Pages	190
ISBN	0-14-004596-1
OCLC	4570177
Dewey Decimal	823/.9/14
LC Class	PZ4.S735 Tak 1978 PR6037.P29

The Takeover is a novel by the Scottish author Muriel Spark. It was first published in 1976.

It is set in Nemi, Italy between 1973 and 1975. The author had moved to Italy as a permanent resident in the late 1960s.^[1]

Plot summary[]

Three large villas overlooking Lake Nemi are owned by the wealthy, glamorous American Maggie Radcliffe. One is occupied by her son and daughter-in-law. A second is leased by an Italian doctor and his two children. The third is occupied by the eccentric Hubert Mallindaine, who believes himself to be the descendant of the offspring of the Emperor Caligula's mythical liaison with Diana. Once a trusted friend of Maggie Radcliffe, Hubert is now an unwelcome house-sitter whom she wants evicted as quickly as possible.

Hubert is not so easily removed, however, and his intransigence and liquidation of Maggie's assets in the house (including a Gauguin) is mirrored in the loss of much of Maggie's wealth, from burglary to outright embezzlement of her entire estate. Events conspire however to cause both to review what they consider important.

Themes[]

As with several other Spark novels, one theme is the disintegration of 'timeless' values in modern society, in this instance the role of religion (represented by Hubert's bogus Diana cult and two indolent, chortling Catholic priests) and the role of money: mostly unseen, or buried. A larger-scale backdrop is provided by the 1973 oil crisis.

Hubert's secretary, Pauline Thin, shares her surname with the Edinburgh-based stationer James Thin, who supplied Spark's notebooks in which she wrote all her novels in longhand.

References[]

External links[]

• New York Times review by Margaret Drabble

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