Reading Group

Prehistoric Double Bill

The Inheritors by William Golding 
& Stig of the Dump by Clive King

As startling to read now as it was on its appearance in 1955,  William Golding's boldly fictional depiction of a Neanderthal band's clash with a band of Homo Sapiens is a powerful, poetic challenge to conventional notions of human evolution and exclusivity, particularly celebrated for its sensitive inhabiting of the pre-historic mind. For this meeting, it will be paired with Clive King's 1963 classic, telling of young Barney's rewarding friendship with the mysterious Stig - a man who wears skins, uses flint tools and lives in a chalk pit, having seemingly strayed from a very different past. A shrewd, subtle, haunting book, conceived for children but widely treasured by adults.  RPJ