# The Quest for Corvo

Canonical: https://www.bookquiver.com/aja-symons/the-quest-for-corvo/9780940322615

![The Quest for Corvo](https://quivercdn.com/covers/nyrb-classics/aja-symons/the-quest-for-corvo_978-09-4032-261-5.jpg?v=2026-06-22%2007%3A01%3A46)

- Book: [The Quest for Corvo](https://www.bookquiver.com/aja-symons/the-quest-for-corvo) ([The Quest for Corvo.md](https://www.bookquiver.com/aja-symons/the-quest-for-corvo.md))
- Authors: [A.J.A. Symons](https://www.bookquiver.com/aja-symons)
- Publisher: nyrb_classics
- ISBN: 978-09-4032-261-5
- Pages: 1
- Language: en_US
- Binding: Softcover

## Description

One summer afternoon A. J. A. Symons is handed a peculiar novel called Hadrian the Seventh and, captivated by this forgotten masterpiece, determines to learn everything he can about its mysterious author. Symons proceeds as a detective might, investigating leads, collecting evidence and corresponding with witnesses. The object of his search is Frederick Rolfe, the self-appointed Baron Corvo - artist, rejected candidate for priesthood and author of serially autobiographical fictions - and its story is told in The Quest for Corvo : a dazzling portrait of an insoluble tangle of talents, frustrated ambitions, arrogance and paranoia. The book, which reads with all the excitement of detective fiction, is at once a literary pilgrimage and reflection on the obsessions and deceptions which lie at the heart of biography.