Tragedy In Blue

Richard Thoma's Tragedy In Blue dates from 1936, and has been described by Henry Miller in his seminal study The Books In My Life as "A poetic justification, unique in its genre, and true as only highly imaginative works can be... a breviary for the initiated". First published by the Obelisk Press in Paris in an edition of only 100 copies and later reprinted anonymously under the title The Book Of Sapphire, Thoma's short novella announces itself as an "evocation of the Middle Ages, their splendour, their abomination and their God". It is a vivid and intense depiction of the Satanic child-killer Gilles de Rais' life and crimes, remarkable for its baroque imagery.