Down There on a Visit was published by Simon & Schuster in 1962. The book consists of four novellas, each set in a different period and each centered on a different character: “Mr. Lancaster” (1928, a visit to a bitter, isolated Englishman on a Greek island), “Ambrose” (1933, a stay with a charismatic self-destroyer on another Greek island), “Waldemar” (1938, the narrator’s failed attempt to rescue a young German from the Nazis), and “Paul” (1940s, an encounter with a sinister spiritual teacher in Hollywood).
The title is from Dante — “down there on a visit” to the various circles of hell — and each novella is a descent into a different form of damnation. Lancaster is damned by bitterness, Ambrose by self-indulgence, Waldemar by circumstance, Paul by a nihilism disguised as spiritual seeking. The narrator, “Christopher,” is present in each story as a witness and occasional participant, and his evolution across the four sections — from naive young man to disillusioned middle-aged writer — provides the book’s through-line.
The “Paul” section is the book’s most controversial and most interesting. Paul is a thinly fictionalized version of a real figure in Isherwood’s Hollywood circle, and his spiritual community — which combines genuine mystical aspiration with sexual exploitation and psychological manipulation — is described with an ambivalence that reflects Isherwood’s own complicated relationship with Eastern spirituality.
Collecting Down There on a Visit
First edition (Simon & Schuster, New York, 1962): Cloth binding, dust jacket.
Market values:
- First edition, fine/fine: $100–$300
- Very good/very good: $40–$100
- UK first (Methuen, 1962): $80–$200