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The Killer
8vo A good copy with some browning/foxing to page edges in Dw with scuffing to edges and corners and scuffing, small splits and minor losses to spine top and tail
224 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1970
3 people are currently reading
128 people want to read
About the author
Colin Wilson
518 books1,285 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads database.
Colin Henry Wilson was born and raised in Leicester, England, U.K. He left school at 16, worked in factories and various occupations, and read in his spare time. When Wilson was 24, Gollancz published The Outsider (1956) which examines the role of the social 'outsider' in seminal works of various key literary and cultural figures. These include Albert Camus, Jean-Paul Sartre, Ernest Hemingway, Hermann Hesse, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, William James, T. E. Lawrence, Vaslav Nijinsky and Vincent Van Gogh and Wilson discusses his perception of Social alienation in their work. The book was a best seller and helped popularize existentialism in Britain. Critical praise though, was short-lived and Wilson was soon widely criticized.
Wilson's works after The Outsider focused on positive aspects of human psychology, such as peak experiences and the narrowness of consciousness. He admired the humanistic psychologist Abraham Maslow and corresponded with him. Wilson wrote The War Against Sleep: The Philosophy of Gurdjieff on the life, work and philosophy of G. I. Gurdjieff and an accessible introduction to the Greek-Armenian mystic in 1980. He argues throughout his work that the existentialist focus on defeat or nausea is only a partial representation of reality and that there is no particular reason for accepting it. Wilson views normal, everyday consciousness buffeted by the moment, as "blinkered" and argues that it should not be accepted as showing us the truth about reality. This blinkering has some evolutionary advantages in that it stops us from being completely immersed in wonder, or in the huge stream of events, and hence unable to act. However, to live properly we need to access more than this everyday consciousness. Wilson believes that our peak experiences of joy and meaningfulness are as real as our experiences of angst and, since we are more fully alive at these moments, they are more real. These experiences can be cultivated through concentration, paying attention, relaxation and certain types of work.
Colin Henry Wilson was born and raised in Leicester, England, U.K. He left school at 16, worked in factories and various occupations, and read in his spare time. When Wilson was 24, Gollancz published The Outsider (1956) which examines the role of the social 'outsider' in seminal works of various key literary and cultural figures. These include Albert Camus, Jean-Paul Sartre, Ernest Hemingway, Hermann Hesse, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, William James, T. E. Lawrence, Vaslav Nijinsky and Vincent Van Gogh and Wilson discusses his perception of Social alienation in their work. The book was a best seller and helped popularize existentialism in Britain. Critical praise though, was short-lived and Wilson was soon widely criticized.
Wilson's works after The Outsider focused on positive aspects of human psychology, such as peak experiences and the narrowness of consciousness. He admired the humanistic psychologist Abraham Maslow and corresponded with him. Wilson wrote The War Against Sleep: The Philosophy of Gurdjieff on the life, work and philosophy of G. I. Gurdjieff and an accessible introduction to the Greek-Armenian mystic in 1980. He argues throughout his work that the existentialist focus on defeat or nausea is only a partial representation of reality and that there is no particular reason for accepting it. Wilson views normal, everyday consciousness buffeted by the moment, as "blinkered" and argues that it should not be accepted as showing us the truth about reality. This blinkering has some evolutionary advantages in that it stops us from being completely immersed in wonder, or in the huge stream of events, and hence unable to act. However, to live properly we need to access more than this everyday consciousness. Wilson believes that our peak experiences of joy and meaningfulness are as real as our experiences of angst and, since we are more fully alive at these moments, they are more real. These experiences can be cultivated through concentration, paying attention, relaxation and certain types of work.
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
October 11, 2020
Fascinating but grueling novel about the (fictional) life of the burglar Arthur Lingard, as recounted by an attending psychiatrist who forms a quick affinity with his troubled patient - one who is cleverly concealing hidden depths beneath a veneer of mulish stupidity. Alas, those depths are far deeper than the good doctor ever imagined: Arthur is hiding a long career as a serial abuser, rapist, and killer.
Colin Wilson's distanced approach made this off-putting story interesting and often admirable. I love horror and mysteries, but I am not enchanted by tales done in the True Crime style nor do I enjoy overly graphic depictions of various abuses and depredations. Such activities are very explicitly detailed here. I'm more of an atmosphere and ambiguity kind of horror fan, and this novel has neither. There is mystery, but the mystery is just how evil is he? rather than the sort of mysteries I prefer. But Wilson's dry refusal to create a salacious experience lifted the material, turned it into something contemplative. Lingard is a rumination on motivation and how the imagination can become twisted, corrupted. Its protagonist desperately wants to believe that Arthur is redeemable, that something can come out of all that intelligence and creativity. This is a very Colin Wilson stance - he's an iconoclast who writes only about iconoclasts. The book functions as a puzzle for the author himself: what to think when his mind-expanding ideas come out of the mouth of a predatory psychopath? It is also a thematic follow-up to the superior Glass Cage.
At times, the author's nonchalant, undramatic style was itself hard to bear. A house crammed full of merrily incestuous kids is a lot, but a story that carefully describes the specific details of their exploits is a lot more. Same goes for a positively portrayed character whose "open-minded" perspective on sexual relations with uncle, brother, and cousins is given an Earth Mother sheen. That was hard for me to buy into or even accept as plausible, let alone healthy. Wilson's non-judgmental approach to sex is perhaps laudable, but that approach became rather a trial for me.
No trial at all were the awesome Lovecraftian flourishes in the first part of the book, which focuses on Arthur's delusions during an extended break from reality (one which brings the psychiatrist into his orbit). Fascinating, at times darkly humorous stuff. But then Arthur and the novel itself move back into grueling reality, which despite being its own kind of absorbing, is not really my cup of tea.
Colin Wilson's distanced approach made this off-putting story interesting and often admirable. I love horror and mysteries, but I am not enchanted by tales done in the True Crime style nor do I enjoy overly graphic depictions of various abuses and depredations. Such activities are very explicitly detailed here. I'm more of an atmosphere and ambiguity kind of horror fan, and this novel has neither. There is mystery, but the mystery is just how evil is he? rather than the sort of mysteries I prefer. But Wilson's dry refusal to create a salacious experience lifted the material, turned it into something contemplative. Lingard is a rumination on motivation and how the imagination can become twisted, corrupted. Its protagonist desperately wants to believe that Arthur is redeemable, that something can come out of all that intelligence and creativity. This is a very Colin Wilson stance - he's an iconoclast who writes only about iconoclasts. The book functions as a puzzle for the author himself: what to think when his mind-expanding ideas come out of the mouth of a predatory psychopath? It is also a thematic follow-up to the superior Glass Cage.
At times, the author's nonchalant, undramatic style was itself hard to bear. A house crammed full of merrily incestuous kids is a lot, but a story that carefully describes the specific details of their exploits is a lot more. Same goes for a positively portrayed character whose "open-minded" perspective on sexual relations with uncle, brother, and cousins is given an Earth Mother sheen. That was hard for me to buy into or even accept as plausible, let alone healthy. Wilson's non-judgmental approach to sex is perhaps laudable, but that approach became rather a trial for me.
No trial at all were the awesome Lovecraftian flourishes in the first part of the book, which focuses on Arthur's delusions during an extended break from reality (one which brings the psychiatrist into his orbit). Fascinating, at times darkly humorous stuff. But then Arthur and the novel itself move back into grueling reality, which despite being its own kind of absorbing, is not really my cup of tea.
November 19, 2016
I read this whilst working at a Psychiatric Hospital in the north of England and it impressed me with its authenticity. Many years later I would go on to work in a prison for six years and this book always stayed in the back of my mind. In this modern age of wall-to-wall serial killer fantasy dramas The Killer deserves to have been more widely read and remembered as a vivid, anti-sensationalist take on the examination of a murderer. We have been repeatedly conned by modern dramas that cops catch killers thanks to groovy technology, an uncanny ability to 'occupy the shoes of the murderer', predict their psychological make-up and profile them with unerring accuracy. Colin Wilson gets to the heart of the matter in this book and nails the utter alienness of a cold killer without resorting to cheap tricks, shocks and stagecraft. A really excellent and chilling book.
June 3, 2012
Colin Wilson is a human potential enthusiast who has the habit of restating the beliefs he presents in his serious works of philosophy and psychology in the popular forms of mystery novels, horror fantasies and sensationalistic coffee table books about crimes and criminals. Presumably, this is the result of four factors:
1. He is obsessed by the topic of human potential and mightily upset that it is rarely fulfilled...
2. and, then, too often, in its perverted forms
3. He wants to spread the word and hopes popular books may attract people who wouldn't read his serious writing.
4. He has to make a living.
1. He is obsessed by the topic of human potential and mightily upset that it is rarely fulfilled...
2. and, then, too often, in its perverted forms
3. He wants to spread the word and hopes popular books may attract people who wouldn't read his serious writing.
4. He has to make a living.
November 17, 2016
I was hooked. It's certainly not your typical murder mystery as the psychological examination give us insight into how and why Lingard killed. I think it was well written, there wasn't any times when Wilson went off of tangents discussing heavy psychologist talk and theories. It all made sense to me. I'm not a fan of incenstual or rape-y stories so that was a little bit of a turn off but I think overall I was quite engaged and enjoyed the book.
August 7, 2025
I finished this one feeling like I needed to shower.
This book was slow-paced, anticlimactic, and spoke about incest in such a normal way that it made my skin crawl. I should have expected this from a book that claims to be about a "sex killer", but the perverse details about the sexuality of young children were so uncomfortable and felt unnecessary.
Every female character in this book is painted in the worst light - as shallow, provocative objects. I didn't hear a single woman described as anything nicer than "pretty" or "sexual" while the male characters were painted in a much more complex and flattering light.
I expected a lot more action from the story, but things didn't ramp up until the last couple of chapters, which felt like a waste. I honestly regret finishing this book, and it only gets two stars because of the visceral reactions I had to many of the nasty details contained within the story.
This book was slow-paced, anticlimactic, and spoke about incest in such a normal way that it made my skin crawl. I should have expected this from a book that claims to be about a "sex killer", but the perverse details about the sexuality of young children were so uncomfortable and felt unnecessary.
Every female character in this book is painted in the worst light - as shallow, provocative objects. I didn't hear a single woman described as anything nicer than "pretty" or "sexual" while the male characters were painted in a much more complex and flattering light.
I expected a lot more action from the story, but things didn't ramp up until the last couple of chapters, which felt like a waste. I honestly regret finishing this book, and it only gets two stars because of the visceral reactions I had to many of the nasty details contained within the story.
June 2, 2023
Closer to a 4.5. This was a grimy and disturbing read. It could easily been a Non Fictional book. Incest, Rape, Murder and Fetishism but not exploitative. Closest thing I could think of would be the movie Henry Portrait Of A Serial Killer
Read
July 25, 2011Excellent.
August 10, 2016
Colin Wilson thriller that I read back in 1978.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews