One of the most perfect works of English literature. Golding's "sea" trilogy. Three novels dedicated to the theme of the tragic clash between dreams and reality, between the imaginary and the existing. The young intellectual Edmund Talbot sails from England to Australia, where he, like hundreds of impoverished nobles like him, is provided with a lucrative sinecure. On a dirty boat, among the endless diversity of human faces, characters and destinies, he, cut off from life, will have to see life in all its diversity - an exciting and frightening life, rough and colorful. The dreamer Edmund is not a participant, but only an outside observer of the stories playing out before his eyes. But the sharper and more immediate is his reaction to what is happening...