A Voice Through A Cloud

Blurb

A Voice Through a Cloud is an autobiographical novel by Denton Welch, who became a writer after a serious accident which had long-term effects on his health. The book describes his bicycle accident when he was an art student, and subsequent experiences in hospitals wards and a nursing home. The book was almost complete when the writer died in December 1948 aged 33.
Denton Welch was anxious to complete the novel when his health, precarious since his accident, was worsening. As described in the foreword: "As late as the summer of 1948, long after most people in his condition would have adopted the life of a permanent invalid, his tremendous will-power enabled him to live normally and even strenuously during the increasingly short intervals between the crises of his illness.... Towards the end he could only work for three or four minutes at a time... Complication after complication set in.... Even then, he made colossal and nearly successful attempts to finish the book." The foreword was by Eric Oliver, with whom the writer shared a house for the last few years of his life, and who was instrumental in the book being published by John Lehmann.