The Lyre of Orpheus

The Lyre of Orpheus, the concluding book in Robertson Davies' Cornish Trilogy. No particular back story to this choice; I just enjoyed his cross-cultural interweaving of different arts, personalities and relating them to myths and character archetypes. In this case it is the art patron Arthur Cornish who finds an uncomfortable parallel to King Arthur in his funding of the staging for an unfinished opera by ETA Hoffman. In his obituary the Times wrote, "Davies encompassed all the great elements of life ... His novels combined deep seriousness and psychological inquiry with fantasy and exuberant mirth." Not sure I'll get away with a trilogy here but all the same I would recommend you start with the Rebel Angels if you were interested in working though to this one.