What a colossal waste of my life. Nothing happens. Literally. That's what's wrong with this book. It's a freshman-level fiction workshop gone horribly awry. And it won what?

Authors who commit suicide find their Lovelybones-eye view from the afterlife brings them no comfort:

David Foster Wallace : Oh my God - look at that dreadful biography of me... and it's selling too... it's like they're murdering me all over again ... oh if I could only commit suicide all over again - but up here, you can't!

John Kennedy Toole : Oh shut up you preening self-regarding self-annotating depressing pedant, what about ME?? My God, if I'd only persevered for another year or so, I'd have been rich! Famous! Women would have wanted to sleep with me... maybe! Look at those sales figures! I'm so miserable! If there was only a way to commit suicide again up here again... but there isn't....

B S Johnson : Put a sock in it - your situation is, admittedly, redolent of a sublime irony, but the afterlife of a real artist - me - not you, me - a real avant-gardist, a true believer - is wretched - look - hardly any of my God damned books are in print any more. No one loves them, just the odd post-grad creep scribbling a note in the margins of something unreadable. If there was only a way to commit suicide again up here again... but there isn't....

Sylvia Plath : Bloody men! Up here! Again! No escape! And look! They're giving Ted Hughes a plaque in Westminster Abbey! Fuck!

Una de las cosas que más curiosidad me daba de este libro, eran las pasiones que siempre ha levantado, tanto para bien como para mal. No estoy acostumbrado a ver críticas tibias de esta novela, o siempre se pone un altar o en la categoría de lo peor. Y a mí estos libros que aman o detestan, siempre me llaman mucho la atención. Cosas de la vida, al final va a ser mi opinión la primera que vea neutra y tibia jajaja. El caso es que entiendo tanto a adoradores como detractores, ya que comparto con ellos sus motivos.

Vamos por partes, y primero voy a hablar de los puntos positivos de la novela, que son muchos. Me gustó esa crítica tan obvia a muchas cosas, pero sobre todo al conjuto de la sociedad. Como lo diferente suele ser motivo de burla, vamos a ir viendo está crítica a través del trato que reciben mujeres, negros, homosexuales o pobres. Prácticamente todos los personajes entran en estre trato injusto a otros, salvo alguno suelto que se salva. Esa ironía todo el tiempo latente en la mayoría de los comentarios me encantó.

También he valorado mucho que, aun siendo yo un lector complicado para la risa, me haya provocado bastantes. Era imposible no reírse a carcajadas con algunas de las situaciones tan disparatadas que provocaba Ignatius. Sobre todo alucinaba con la cara que tenía al inventar la realidad sobre la marcha, siempre a su favor. Cara y habilidad. Los personajes creo ques están bien dibujados y me ha gustado en especial la creación de Ignatius, Irene, la señora Levy y Trixie. Tampoco es complejo de leer, lo cual no dificulta su lectura en ese sentido, aunque si hay otras cosas que la dificultan. Y es ahí donde empieza lo malo.

Algunas partes se me han hecho algo tediosas de leer, sobre todo esas en las que Ignatius escribía en su diario durante 20 páginas explicando diferentes cosas. A veces eran interesantes, otras no. También se me complicaba la lectura cuando Ignatius soltaba algún comentario fuera de lugar y ni siquiera salvable por considerarlo crítica. Cuando expresa el deseo de que una mujer sea violada en varias ocasiones, por mucha crítica o parodia que haga el personaje, me es imposible disfrutar de él en positivo. Y digo esto de en positivo, porque que Ignatius es horrible lo aceptamos todos, pero he leído muchas veces que llega un punto en la novela que te encariñas de él e incluso lo compadeces. Con esos comentarios jamás podría compadecerlo. Puede gustarme como personaje, que me gusta de hecho, pero como el personaje negativo que es. Aunque no sea el único villano de la historia, y de alguna manera, pueda pasar a víctima en algunos casos, sigue teniendo el porte de villano para mí. Nada le sucede porque sí, todo lo provoca él con su egoísmo.

El caso es que me he quedado en ese punto medio que os decía al principio. En ningún caso he conseguido sentir pena o campasión por Ignatius hasta el punto de cogerle cariño, porque es un horror de persona, pero he entendido todo el tiempo esa parodia crítica y por eso no me ha impedido leer la historia y disfrutarla bastante a ratos. El resumen final sería: ni mucho, ni tan poco.

El personaje de Ignatius Reilly - filósofo obeso contra el mundo - es único, adictivo diría yo. Sus aventuras son quijotescas y lo mejor es que, de alguna manera, va transformando a la gente que encuentra en seres igual o más raros que él. Nos sumerge en un auténtico museo del frikismo, una farsa grotesca en que todo es divertido y trágico al mismo tiempo. ¡Y la madre! Irene Reilly es lo mejor, en teoría es la que tendría que poner orden, pero ella también tiene sus cositas.

El libro se estructura como una novela picaresca que recorre New Orleans en los cambiantes años 60. Ignatius Reilly se ve enfrentado a la necesidad de ganarse la vida y su inserción en el mercado laboral tendrá lugar con una aproximación muy creativa. Todos los personajes secundarios son geniales y el autor nos ofrece un transfondo de crítica social que no hay que perder de vista.

Es muy difícil en un libro de humor y esperpento mantener la intriga y la atención durante casi 400 páginas sin que decaiga, pero conmigo lo ha logrado. Eso sí, o lo amas o lo odias, pero clásico lo es.

A Confederacy of Dunces, John Kennedy Toole

A Confederacy of Dunces is a picaresque novel by American novelist John Kennedy Toole which reached publication in 1980, eleven years after Toole's suicide.

Published through the efforts of writer Walker Percy (who also contributed a foreword) and Toole's mother, the book became first a cult classic, then a mainstream success; it earned Toole a posthumous Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1981, and is now considered a canonical work of modern literature of the Southern United States. Toole wrote the novel in 1963 during his last few months in Puerto Rico.

Ignatius Jacques Reilly is an overweight and unemployed thirty-year-old with a degree in Medieval History who still lives with his mother, Irene Reilly.

He lives in utter loathing of the world around him, which he feels has lost the values of geometry and theology.

One afternoon, Reilly's mother drives him 'downtown in the old Plymouth, and while she was at the doctor’s seeing about her arthritis, Ignatius had bought some sheet music at Werlein’s for his trumpet and a new string for his lute.'

While Reilly waits for his mother, Officer Angelo Mancuso approaches Reilly and demands that the latter produce identification.

Affronted and outraged by Mancuso's unwarranted zeal and officious manner, Reilly protests his innocence to the crowd while denouncing the city's vices and the graft of the local police.

An elderly man, Claude Robichaux, takes Reilly's part, denouncing Officer Mancuso and the police as communiss.

In the resulting uproar, Reilly and his embarrassed mother escape, taking refuge in a bar in case Officer Mancuso is still in hot pursuit. In the bar, Mrs Reilly then drinks too much. As a result, she crashes her car. ...

تاریخ نخستین خوانش: یکی از روزهای سال 2014میلادی

عنوان: اتحادیه ی ابلهان، اثر: جان کندی تول؛ برگردان: پیمان خاکسار؛ تهران، نشر به نگار، 1391؛ در 467ص؛ شابک 9789646332836؛ چاپ چهارم تا ششم 1392، چاپ دیگر تهران، زاوش، 1392؛ شابک 9786007283189؛ چاپ دیگر تهران، نشر چشمه، 1393؛ شابک9786002292742؛ موضوع: داستانهای نویسندگان ایالات متحده آمریکا - سده 20م

سبک نگارش اتحادیه ابلهان، رندنامه یا همان «پیکارسک» است؛

چکیده: داستان زندگی پسر جوان عظیم‌ الجثه‌ ای به نام «ایگنیشس» است، که با مادرش زندگی می‌کند، و روحیه آرمانگرایانه دارد؛ در عین حال فردی تنبل است، که مدام برای خانواده و شهر خود دردسرساز می‌شود؛ او از جامعه مصرف‌ گرای آمریکایی بیزار است، و جهان امروز را سیرکی سیار میبیند؛ یک مأمور مخفی دست و پا چلفتی، که برای تنبیه به مستراح ایستگاه اتوبوس تبعید شده، پیرمرد عاشق‌ پیشه‌ ای که فکر می‌کند همه پلیس‌ها کمونیست هستنند، یک پیرزن فقیر دائم ‌الخمر، رئیس بی‌انگیزه ی کارخانه ی در حال ورشکستگی تولید شلوار، و کارمندان و کارگرانی بدتر از او، زنی که به سبک بیمارگونه و مسخره ‌ای نظریات نوین روان‌شناسی را بلغور می‌کند، و در حقیقت به هجو می‌کشد، هات ‌داگ فروش متقلبی که برای ادای دین به سنت و تاریخ «نیواورلئان» لباس فرم دزد دریایی، بر فروشندگان خویش می‌پوشاند؛ این‌ها و شخصیت‌های دیگری از این دست، در ماجراهایی موازی کنار و دوشادوش قرار می‌گیرند و در نهایت همانند تکه‌ هایی از یک پازل، به هم می‌پیوندند، تا اتحادیه‌ ای از «ابلهان» را در جامعه ‌ای که نمونه ی عصر کنونی است، تشکیل دهند؛ آنها همچنین با کارها و حرف‌های بی‌معنی خویش، همانند دلقکها، بر باور «ایگنیشس»، قهرمان محوری رمان، که جهان امروز را سیرکی سیار می‌بیند، صحه میگذارند

تاریخ بهنگام رسانی 27/07/1399هجری خورشیدی؛ 08/06/1400هجری خورشیدی؛ ا. شربیانی

51st book of 2020.

To begin, I have slightly adapted a quote from Ignatius - I've removed the word 'smut' so it can be used in this context for my needs.

"Is this supposed to be comedy? I haven't laughed once!"

In all places people were supposedly laughing their heads off, I was probably sighing or rolling my eyes.

I also felt like the neighbour in this book who continually shouted 'Shut up!' throughout the book. I wanted every character in this book to shut up.

I've wanted to read this for a while, and the tragedy of Toole's life made me want to read it and love it more. However, it didn't happen. I am exhausted, and wanted, at parts, to eat glass.

I detest belligerent people and therefore hated this supposedly humorous cowboy book. Forget it.

Confederacy of Dunces is a masterpiece of satire and irony, a worthy recipient of the Pulitzer Prize for best novel.

It is funny, sometimes uproariously so, and I smiled and chuckled throughout. Toole’s depression and loss was not just of himself and his family, but also of us all, a genius who can create this comedic virtuosity might have written a folio of great work, and perhaps Confederacy was not even his greatest. Or perhaps, the spark that drove him to so bitingly observe our culture and time was also the flame from within that ate him away too, I guess we’ll never know.

Ignatius J. Reilly is to literature as Homer Simpson is to our later culture, a grotesque more than a picaresque, a satirical slap in the face of who we are, a fool’s loving but damning foil to the king. The comparisons to Don Quixote are unavoidable, but whereas Quixote was roguish and loveable, Ignatius never achieves the heroic, even mock heroism. And he is never loveable. And perhaps that is a mark of Toole’s true, painful vision, that our idiosyncrasies need to be made fun of, but there is no gentleness left, that only a rough and stinging rebuke will show through the neon and carnival barkers.

Maybe Ignatius was most timely amidst Toole’s own insanity, in the mid sixties, and by the time of Walker Percy’s “discovery” some of the edge had already worn away, or perhaps even, it was still just poking harmless fun at the products of society. Thirty years later, and the grotesque center stage with spotlights on Ignatius have become as common as reality TV shows, the characters no longer charicatures because of familiarity. So while Confederacy of Dunces is a modern classic, some of its stinging comment has been lost amidst too frequent of the same targets and too many opportunists to admonish gently. Thirty years later, Ignatius is no longer a caricature but a portrait.

But to its credit, Dunces has some redemption, some easy to find, other examples more subtle. By the end, Mrs. Reilly can stand her own ground, while still being a mother who loves her son, Gus Levy has excorsied the demons from his past and seems able to meet future challenges head on. And the true hero of COD, Burma Jones, who, by a lucky stroke of PR savvy, will be a vagrant no more.

Good book.

** 2018 addendum - it is a testament to great literature that a reader recalls the work years later and this is a book about which I frequently think. Ignatius is the memory and this portrait that Toole has given us is not just of this man, but he is a microcosm of a time and place, but in another sense, timeless.

But I ain’t worried about politics. I’m worried about dying halfway decent. Claude can be kind to a person, and that’s more than you can do with all your politics and all your graduating smart. For everything nice I ever done for you, I just get kicked around. I want to be treated nice by somebody before I die! You learnt everything, Ignatius, except how to be a human being.”

My experience with this book is that it is extremely polarizing. There are as many 1 star reviews as there are 5 star reviews. Ignatius J. Reilly is quite an unlikeable character. He believes himself to be in the wrong century, believes himself to be vastly smarter and better than everyone else. He has a master’s degree but can’t keep a job. He has tortured his mother for the last twelve years or so by being a complete ass. He’s very nearly insane. He has no clue how or no desire to have normal interactions with people, using racist/misogynistic/ableist/terms all over the place. If you need your main character to be likable or someone you root for, this might not be the book for you. One cannot like or root for Ignatius.

Readers are not supposed to like him. Readers supposed to be disgusted by him (mentally and physically). And I can read about his wild escapades and laugh, and laugh, and laugh, because there is so much humor in this book if you realize how the author uses this character and the supporting characters around him. My favorite characters are: 1.) Miss Trixie, the 80-something year old senile employee of Levy Pants who should have retired long ago (and is desperate to retire) but Mrs. Levy insists on keeping her busy and useful or she will fade away. In my mind, I see Lily Tomlin when I read Miss Trixie. And 2.) Burma Jones, the black man working for less than minimum wage so he isn’t hauled off by the police for vagrancy. In my mind, I see a younger Eddie Murphy. That would be great casting, if I do say so myself, because those two characters have some of the best lines and scenes in this book. And Jones’s dialogue is just like an Eddie Murphy SNL skit. I dont believe it will ever be made as a film; god knows multiple people have tried over the past many decades. Which is fine by me because this book is almost perfect by itself.

As an added bonus, I grew up in this part of the world. The movie is set in the early 60s, and although I wasn’t born until a decade or so later, I knew this place — the streets, the landmarks, the buildings, the vendors selling pralines in front of the cathedral, the dialects, and the people (minus the obvious exaggeration given by the author).

This book will always be 5 stars for me.

First things first: this book isn't quite the hilarious masterpiece everyone would have you believe. Is it funny? Yes. Is it smart? Unquestionably. Are the characters interesting and well-developed? I'd say yes. However, is it as funny and smart and are the characters as interesting and well-developed as people will tell you? No.

While reading this book in semi-public places, I had no less than 3 different people come up to me and tell me how hilarious the book was (why do people do that anyway? Are they afraid I'm not going to get through it, so they feel the need to interrupt me and reassure me? Do they think my sense of humor is underdeveloped and I won't be able to see the humor myself, so I need to have the fact that the book is funny explained to me beforehand? Just leave me alone and let me read the book for myself!). I thought it was a very funny book, but it wasn't so exceptionally funny that I would walk up to a stranger while they're in mid-sentence and let them know that hilarity was about to ensue, if it hadn't already.

Ignatius J. Reilly is an unquestionably great character, and Burma Jones was quite good as well. But I felt that the rest of the cast were a little one-dimensional, existing mainly to set up jokes and the like. And as great as Ignatius is, his act does get a little repetitive.

Parts of the book's plot feel a little dated as well, such as the pornography arrest at the book's climax. Why was that illegal, exactly?

All that said, however, the book was a very enjoyable read. I liked it a lot, even if I didn't think it was quite the timeless masterpiece it is made out to be. I think the book benefits greatly from the author's mythology, as detailed in the introduction by Walker Percy (Toole wrote what he thought was the Great American Novel and was so devestated when he was unable to sell the manuscript that he eventually took his own life. His mother eventually found the manuscript, sent it to Percy, who read and loved it, and got the book published posthumously, where it received the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction). Toole clearly regarded the book as great, and I'd suspect he had at least early drafts or outlines of a sequel detailing Ignatius and Myrna's exploits and travails in New York. To me, the obvious attempt of the books ending to create a 'series' of Ignatius J. Reilly books that never happened cheapens the book a bit, but that's probably just me. Overall, it is still a great book, if not the perfect comic novel.

بخاطر علاقه كم به ادبيات پست مدرن و امريكايي و كمدى سياه ٤-٣سال بود كه خوندن اين كتاب به آينده موكول ميكردم تا اينكه اين سرى موفق به خوندن اين رمان خوب شدم.
رمان شروع نسبتاً خوبى داره ولى بعدش تا وسطهاى ماجرا واتفاقاتى كه براى شخصيت اصلى داستان وديگر افراد مرتبط با قصه رخ ميده كسالت بار پيش ميره
كه در عوض ٢-٣فصل آخر كتاب نويسنده به بهترين شكل و با زيبايي تمام ،كتاب به اتمام ميرسونه
و از جامعه ومردم و عصرى حرف ميزنه كه ريا ونيرنگ ودروغ وتقليد شاخصه هاى اصلى ش هست.
و در اين بين شخصيت اصلى داستان كه حاضر به ترك دنيا وانزوا و خروج از اين جامعه هست ولى حاضر به مصالحه وتقليد وپيروى از اين سيستم ونظام حاكم بر جامعه نميشه .

**قطعا براى شروع واوايل كتاب خوانى اين رمان انتخاب جالبى نيست.**
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انسان ها بايد آگاه شوند،نه اينكه براى حفظ منافع شخصى بازيچه ى دست منفعت طلبان شوند واينكه سكوت مى كنند از همه حقيرتر است ودير يا زود پيامد سكوتش گريبان خودش را نيز مانند بقيه خواهد گرفت.

از متن كتاب

Sorry guys, overall I found it tedious rather than funny