One of Michael Moorcock's most popular fictional creations was Jerry Cornelius, a kind of hip secret agent of ambiguous sexuality; the same characters featured in each of several Cornelius books, but the individual books had little connection with one another, as a variation of the Multiverse theme. The first Jerry Cornelius book, The Final Programme was made into a feature film starring Jon Finch and Jenny Runacre.
Moorcock encouraged other authors to write stories about Jerry Cornelius. (to do: give examples)
Moorcock hints in many places that Cornelius may be an aspect of the Eternal Champion. Characters from the Cornelius novels show up in much of Moorcock's other fiction: for example, Moorcock's Dancers at the End of Time series has a character called Jherek Carnelian; Una Persson appears in the Dancers series, the Oswald Bastable books, and possibly as Oona in the latest Elric books; and Colonel Pyat has his own non-SF series of books by Moorcock, beginning with Byzantium Endures.
The Jerry Cornelius quartet of novels comprises:
- The Final Programme
- A Cure for Cancer
- The English Assassin
- The Condition of Muzak
- Lives and Times of Jerry Cornelius
- The Adventures of Una Persson and Catherine Cornelius in the Twentieth Century
- The Entropy Tango
- The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle (aka Gold Diggers of '77)
- The Alchemist's Question (a novella)
- Firing the Cathedral (a novella)
- Miss Brunner
- Bishop Beesley
- Una Persson
- Catherine Cornelius
- Major Nye
- make list here
