 First edition | |
| Author | Rosemary Sutcliff |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Genre | Historical novel |
| Publisher | Hodder & Stoughton |
Publication date | 1963 |
| Publication place | United Kingdom |
| Media type | Print (Hardback) |
| Pages | 492 pp |
| Preceded by | The Lantern Bearers |
| Followed by | Dawn Wind |
Sword at Sunset is a best-selling 1963 novel by Rosemary Sutcliff. One of her few historical novels written specifically for adults, it is her interpretation of the legend of King Arthur.
This is the first novel that Sutcliff wrote using a first-person singular point of view for her story. In an interview with Raymond H. Thompson (in 1986), she explained that she actually spent the eighteen months while writing this story thinking like a man and felt that the story was being fed to her.
Unlike most of the series The Eagle of the Ninth, it does not follow either the inheritor of the dolphin seal ring or the person who will eventually marry said inheritor; although the current inheritor, the son of the protagonist of The Lantern Bearers, is a minor character in the book, the action follows the character of Artos (Arthur) as established in The Lantern Bearers.