Avram Davidson

Here can be found an evocation of Avram Davidson by someone who knew him personally (spotted at sfsignal). Davidson seemed to be an interesting, if sometimes difficult, personality. His conversion from Judasim to Tenrikyo is somewhat unusual.

I've been meaning to read his works, especially the Peregrine novels, which are set in Late Antiquity. The first one was published in 1971, the same year as Peter Brown's seminal survey The World of Late Antiquity. Interest in that historical epoch was in the air at the time, it seems.

Then there are his Vergil novels. They are not about the historical Vergil, but about the medieval conception of him as a magician and wonder-worker.

And let's not forget his Dr. Esterhazy novels, set in Scythia-Pannonia-Transbalkania, the "waning fourth-largest empire in Europe", clearly an imaginary cousin to the Austro-Hungarian Empire of the nineteenth century.

Here is the page about Davidson in the Great SF & F site.