Synopsis from Barnes & Noble:
"The best-selling, Pulitzer Prize-winning classic hailed by The New York Times Book Review as "a masterwork . . . the novel astonishes with its inventiveness . . . it is nothing less than a grand comic fugue." A Confederacy of Dunces is an American comic masterpiece. John Kennedy Toole's hero, one Ignatius J. Reilly, is "huge, obese, fractious, fastidious, a latter-day Gargantua, a Don Quixote of the French Quarter. His story bursts with wholly original characters, denizens of New Orleans' lower depths, incredibly true-to-life dialogue, and the zaniest series of high and low comic adventures" (Henry Kisor, Chicago Sun-Times)."
It's difficult for me to know what to write about this book. I enjoyed it and found myself not wanting to put it down because I had to know what was going to happen next. The writing style was good, it moved quickly and I didn't get bogged down at all. That said, I didn't find the book as funny as I've always read and heard that it is -- there were numerous times when I found myself smirking at something or thinking, "That was clever," but only 1 or 2 times I actually laughed. I guess my main difficulty is in reconciling how this book is considered one of the "great books of the 20th century." I read somewhere that the author has been compared to Jonathan Swift ("Gulliver's Travels") but I don't get it. I'd really like to know if I'm just missing something or if this book has an undeserved reputation. I'm going to do some research and see if I can get a better grip on it. But like I said, I enjoyed it. I would read it again and I have no problem recommending it to others -- I just question how others have categorized it.
"The best-selling, Pulitzer Prize-winning classic hailed by The New York Times Book Review as "a masterwork . . . the novel astonishes with its inventiveness . . . it is nothing less than a grand comic fugue." A Confederacy of Dunces is an American comic masterpiece. John Kennedy Toole's hero, one Ignatius J. Reilly, is "huge, obese, fractious, fastidious, a latter-day Gargantua, a Don Quixote of the French Quarter. His story bursts with wholly original characters, denizens of New Orleans' lower depths, incredibly true-to-life dialogue, and the zaniest series of high and low comic adventures" (Henry Kisor, Chicago Sun-Times)."
It's difficult for me to know what to write about this book. I enjoyed it and found myself not wanting to put it down because I had to know what was going to happen next. The writing style was good, it moved quickly and I didn't get bogged down at all. That said, I didn't find the book as funny as I've always read and heard that it is -- there were numerous times when I found myself smirking at something or thinking, "That was clever," but only 1 or 2 times I actually laughed. I guess my main difficulty is in reconciling how this book is considered one of the "great books of the 20th century." I read somewhere that the author has been compared to Jonathan Swift ("Gulliver's Travels") but I don't get it. I'd really like to know if I'm just missing something or if this book has an undeserved reputation. I'm going to do some research and see if I can get a better grip on it. But like I said, I enjoyed it. I would read it again and I have no problem recommending it to others -- I just question how others have categorized it.
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