A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole (1980)
My good bud Leah bought me this novel last summer, and I finally got around to reading it. Turns out, it is one of the absolute greatest I have ever read. Posthumously published in 1980, after author John Kennedy Toole's 1969 suicide, A Confederacy of Dunces won the Pullitzer Prize for fiction in 1981. The book is funnier than it is tragic, though there is a definite and sometimes overwhelming sense of sadness in certain sections. Ignatius J. Reilly, is quite possibly the best main character of any book I can think of. He offers up more hilarious quotes than even Holden Caulfield (my two personal favorites being, "In my private apocalypse he will be impaled by his own nightstick" and, "This liberal doxy must be impaled upon the member of a particularly large stallion"), and you love him, hate him and feel sorry for him for having to live with himself. This book is utterly perfect.
My good bud Leah bought me this novel last summer, and I finally got around to reading it. Turns out, it is one of the absolute greatest I have ever read. Posthumously published in 1980, after author John Kennedy Toole's 1969 suicide, A Confederacy of Dunces won the Pullitzer Prize for fiction in 1981. The book is funnier than it is tragic, though there is a definite and sometimes overwhelming sense of sadness in certain sections. Ignatius J. Reilly, is quite possibly the best main character of any book I can think of. He offers up more hilarious quotes than even Holden Caulfield (my two personal favorites being, "In my private apocalypse he will be impaled by his own nightstick" and, "This liberal doxy must be impaled upon the member of a particularly large stallion"), and you love him, hate him and feel sorry for him for having to live with himself. This book is utterly perfect.
The Stranger - Albert Camus (1942)
Another Pullitzer Prize winning novel that I've been meaning to devour for some time, Albert Camus' The Stranger did not disappoint. As short and quick of a read it was (I read it entirely in one sitting at work), the plot's pace was fairly slow. I'm sure the moody feel to the story contributed to that. The Stranger is a dark, straightforward tale of murder which blatantly touches on the philosophy of nihilism. I loved it. It is most definitely worth a read.
Grendel - John Gardner (1971)
In my first semester english class during my senior year of high school, we read the epic Anglo-Saxon poem Beowulf from our annoyingly huge text books. Along with it, my fantastic teacher, Ms. Popp, had us read excerpts from John Gardner's retelling, Grendel, which is narrated by Beowulf's monster by the same name. I've always been fascinated by the character Grendel, so I've wanted to read Gardner's novel ever since it was introduced to me by Ms. Popp. Now that I've finally accomplished this mission, I can say that, though it was not at all what I expected, I was not let down. The portrayal of Grendel in this novel was really fun to read, as he is sort of humanized and there are plenty of parts where I felt sorry for him. His ongoing monologue is sometimes sad, often times humorous and steeped in existential and nihilistic philosophies. I got pretty disinterested in some of his philosophical rambling (aside from his conversation with the heavily nihilistic unnamed dragon), but over all, Grendel was a very intriguing and enjoyable character study.
Another Pullitzer Prize winning novel that I've been meaning to devour for some time, Albert Camus' The Stranger did not disappoint. As short and quick of a read it was (I read it entirely in one sitting at work), the plot's pace was fairly slow. I'm sure the moody feel to the story contributed to that. The Stranger is a dark, straightforward tale of murder which blatantly touches on the philosophy of nihilism. I loved it. It is most definitely worth a read.
Grendel - John Gardner (1971)
In my first semester english class during my senior year of high school, we read the epic Anglo-Saxon poem Beowulf from our annoyingly huge text books. Along with it, my fantastic teacher, Ms. Popp, had us read excerpts from John Gardner's retelling, Grendel, which is narrated by Beowulf's monster by the same name. I've always been fascinated by the character Grendel, so I've wanted to read Gardner's novel ever since it was introduced to me by Ms. Popp. Now that I've finally accomplished this mission, I can say that, though it was not at all what I expected, I was not let down. The portrayal of Grendel in this novel was really fun to read, as he is sort of humanized and there are plenty of parts where I felt sorry for him. His ongoing monologue is sometimes sad, often times humorous and steeped in existential and nihilistic philosophies. I got pretty disinterested in some of his philosophical rambling (aside from his conversation with the heavily nihilistic unnamed dragon), but over all, Grendel was a very intriguing and enjoyable character study.
1 comment:
Did you know The Cure song "Killing an Arab" is about The Stranger?!
Post a Comment