Full review now posted!

Sometimes literary fiction can be stranger than fantasy. This book is a prime example of that. Man, it was weird.

I honestly haven’t been able to decide how I feel about it. I don’t remember ever struggling this much with how to rate a book. On the one hand, this was a unique story told well, with an original and unforgettable cast of characters. On the other hand, it was crude and vulgar at a level that seemed knowingly used to scandalize the reader and keep them absorbed in the story. There were multiple scenes that were incredibly shocking, and felt like they were included for the sole purpose of eliciting gasps of shock. This is sensationalism, pure and simple. I finally decided to settle at four stars, because this is an impactful book with remarkable prose, but I didn’t always appreciate the tactics used to ensure the proper response from the reader.

The whole reason I decided to read this book in the first place was because a wonderful new author whose debut I adored (Cheris Wolas with The Resurrection of Joan Ashby) recommended it. It’s one of her favorites, and her novel has even been compared to it. I completely get that comparison. Here we have the story of an author whose writing was interrupted by marriage and parenthood, who is trying to find their way back to the writing of their youth. Not only do we get the story of the author in these books, but we also get pieces of their writing, so we can experience their art firsthand, which was one of my favorite aspects of both books. I love when authors (referring to Wolas and Irving here, not Ashby and Garp) stretch themselves like this in a book, including various stories written by a fictional character whose voice they had to both create and differentiate from their own. That shows amazing craftsmanship and dedication to their art, in my opinion.

Although I agree with the comparison, I have to confess that I found Joan Ashby and her story superior in every way to that of T.S. Garp. Wolas never used sensationalism to play on my emotions; she elicited them honestly, with a story well told. The shocks in her story never felt cheap or too well-planned to be viewed as honest.

That being said, I understand the appeal and popularity of Garp. His is an unforgettable story, and it’s one that will stick with me. It’s a story that resonates; it just didn’t resonate as deeply with me as I expected. This was my first foray into the writing of John Irving. While it was an odd book that left my response to it muddled, it was without a doubt an interesting experience. This definitely won’t be my last Irving novel.

For more of my reviews, as well as my own fiction and thoughts on life, check out my blog, Celestial Musings.

Ci riproverò senz'altro a brevissimo, sia perché è piaciuto a tanti amici GR, sia perché il mio" libraio di fiducia della Lovat me l'ha consigliato entusiasta (lui adora tutto Irving) e non voglio arrendermi !
Confesso di aver sospeso anche Hotel New Hampshire.... anche questo da riprendere e non mollare !

Ako su sva Irvingova dela ovakva, ja sam presrećan čovek. Svet po Garpu je topao, edukativan, emotivan, inteligentan bildungsroman. Od prvih stranica me je uvukao i nije me ispuštao do samog kraja do te mere da sam imao osećaj da mi je T.S. Garp daleki rođak o kome su se priče prenosile s kolena na koleno, s kontinenta na kontinent.

Dodatna veličina romana se ogleda u neverovatnim "sporednim" likovima. Jedini razlog zbog kojeg ih nazivam sporednim je zato što delo ne nosi njihovo ime. Svi su bogato razvijeni, njihovi životi i motivi su jasni (ili makar logični) i uklapaju se savršeno u svaku Garpovu eru: ne kao posledice, ne kao uzroci, već kao njeni neodvojivi delovi.

Plakao sam, smejao se, ostajao bez reči i navijao. Ovo je svet po Garpu, ali svet za sve.

Garp is the kind of man who always says the wrong thing, but still, he is a worthy hero in this surprisingly still-relevant feminist novel. I don't really like 'funny' novels, but this book really made me laugh.

Ci sono quei libri per cui il giudizio resta sospeso fino alla fine: fino all'ultima pagina non so dire se mi piacciono o meno. Qui, a giudicare dalle stelline, posso dire che alla fine il giudizio è stato positivo.
Questo è un romanzo complesso, bei personaggi, riflessioni sulla letteratura, romanzi dentro il romanzo. C'è il grottesco, il verosimile e l'inverosimile. E il tutto, scritto molto bene anche se forse non scorrevolissimo (ci ho messo in effetti un po' a finirlo).
Lo consiglierei? A molti, ma non a tutti.

Possible mild spoiler alert? I try to keep my reviews to what a "real" book review would contain - this necessitates some detail. After all, what good is a review that provides only information available on the back cover combined with "I liked it" or "I didn't"? That said, someone apparently thinks this particular review of mine contains too much. So consider yourself warned.

The book starts by explaining how Garp came to be by introducing Garp's mother, the headstrong and self-assured nurse Jenny Fields. Jenny Fields decides she wants one baby but has no desire for sex or male companionship-she is not infected by lust, the theme of lust being one this book beats you over the head with. This unlikely beginning has got to be my favorite part of the whole book. Jenny Fields is an intriguing and at least initially likeable character. The first few chapters nicely set the tone of storytelling, another of the book's dominant themes. Moments of lighthearted irony abound.

So Jenny Fields comes by her one baby in a resourceful and innovative, albeit bizarre, manner, and never tells anyone the details. The book continues from the perspective of Jenny, now a school nurse at a prestigious boys' school, as little T.S. Garp grows up. Jenny and Garp go to Vienna after he graduates from high school, to write - for Jenny, her autobiography, for Garp, a novel. Jenny publishes her wildly popular memoir, which instigates, or at least capitalizes on, a political movement. From this point forward, the book spirals downward for me.

I wasn't drawn to any of the characters after the initial connection with Jenny Fields. Most are cliche, farfetched, or actively annoy me. I never liked Garp's wife, the stuck-up, bookish and brilliant yet strikingly beautiful Helen Holm. The post-operation transgendered football player, Roberta, bored met to tears. After the narrative switched to Garp-centric, I lost my connection to Jenny, too, though I still enjoyed her presence and looked forward to her opinions on various things.

The book contains large chunks of Garp's writing, set off in a different font. This technique is necessary to illustrate the distinctions and similarities between Garp's truth and his craft, without which it's not possible to really know what Irving wants you to know about Garp. I came around to the intermittent excerpts by the end, but the first few times I was irritated by the distraction.

In the latter half, Irving exchanges the whimsical irony of the first chapters for a dark, beat you over the head version that dangerously approaches "if you do this bad thing, HORRIBLE things will happen including mutilation and DEATH."

And speaking of irony, I must mention the "Ellen Jamesians," those tortured women who cut off their tongues in solidary with a young rape victim named Ellen James, whose perpetrator did that to her. This group of women is, of course, a blatant example of the fervor for a noble cause gotten out of hand. Neither Garp nor Ellen James herself can muster any sympathy for the Ellen Jamesians, and this rather high-profile conflict is what ultimately brings the book to a resolution. The problem for me was that this was just too caricatured. First, I had trouble accepting that the rapist would cut out the girl's tongue thinking that would prevent her from identifying him (even though the book ridiculed the rapist for his stupidity in doing so). Even accepting that, it seemed beyond even the most extreme versions of reality to think that any notable number of people would cut off their tongues for this reason (even though the book alternatively ridiculed and felt sorry for them for doing so).

But maybe the book, with all its excerpted fiction-within-fiction, was intended as a caricature. I am reminded of the chapter where Helen guesses which parts of the story Garp had just told his young son were embellished. In translating reality, Garp has the control to manipulate any detail, which may improve it, intensify it, or change its goal entirely. In the latter half of the book we see Garp lose control over that truth/fiction distinction, interestingly producing a work that is shocking but feels "real." Perhaps The World According to Garp is the other kind of story - one containing carefully buried truth that isn't supposed to feel "real."

The book kept my interest in spite of my negative impression of its trajectory. This, too, occurs in the story - as one character, in reacting to Garp's third novel, says (not verbatim): "Like it? What's to like about it?! It's horrible! can I have a copy?"

While a large portion of bibliophiles read and adored The World According To Garp during their adolescence, I was too busy reading of apocalypses brought on by green meteorites, three-pronged killer plants and the bomb. Reading it now I understand the attraction that it may have had to a teenager, but I question what a teenager would have taken away from it. Because I know that I am questioning what I have taken away from this book at my age, and I even question the motives and the meaning of this book, if there is any.

While the novel starts off innocently with a coherent voice and some sense of reality, the progression of the novel, and indeed Garp's life, is a progression into soap opera and a ridiculousness that undermined the whole novel for me. I might be too dim to realise that this was the author's intention, or even too dim to see a bigger message here, but it seems that this novel goes so far into not taking itself seriously that I can only surmise that this was just a great big wank for Irving.

I can only try to discern any message that the author had on sex, lust and individuality by glossing over the complete mess that he smears over any message by presenting farcical situations in an otherwise traditional setting and by using Garp's writing to mock the novel that it contains. Just when you start to feel for a character, or start to see a message coming through you are presented with an over-the-top death, killer fanatics, Tootsie style drag or some other contrived scenario that makes you go "Ugh". Maybe this was the intention of the author, I'm too dim to tell.

While I am critical of the motives of the author and story there is still a lot to enjoy here. The outer characters I have a lot more sympathy for and they were a joy to read about. Even Jenny in her way was a pleasure. There is some damn fine writing going on here. Writing that will stick to your sides and and keep you reading despite being about a character that is a selfish, bumbling and likeable asshole.

So I can see why teenagers would gravitate to this story. It was Kurt Cobain before Kurt Cobain. It's full of extremism, sex, lust and lost people. Everyone is a figurehead for something. I just wish that the smear of undermining bullshit wasn't there.

I'd say that "Lolita" and "Love in the Time of Cholera" are the two best written books I've ever read. But if I had to pick my all time favorite book I'd probably go with "The World According to Garp". Irving takes us on the path of T.S. Garp's life from conception to death and I was enthralled every step of the way. This book is full of humanity, full of both light and dark humor, and full of insight into the human condition. Irving took over from Charles Dickens and put his own unique spin on telling a tale and creating characters that stay with you. I'll also add that while the movie based on it is less than a masterpiece (not that it wasn't a valiant effort to condense a lenghthy complex story), Robin Williams gave an admirable performance that showed he had a lot more range and substance as an actor than most people probably realized at the time, and John Lithgow was nothing short of glorious. But this not a movie review, so let me conclude by stating that if you are a fan of masterful story telling and larger than life but still quite realistic characters, pick up this book. I'm jealous of everyone who gets to accomplish what I can do no longer - to read this wonderful book for the very first time.

Zabavno, neočekivano, šokantno, za moj ukus možda malo previše smrti, ali sve je to život, a po Garpu, sigurno da je vrijedan življenja!

Dull, dull, dull. Boring people doing boring things. Even the sex is boring.

I've spent some time wondering whether everyone is so boring because it's the world according to Garp, and Garp himself is boring. The novel is cleverly structured (it could be a literary theorist's wet dream); Garp himself is a novelist, and shards of his work appear throughout this novel, including the third chapter of his third novel, The World According to Bensenhaver. (Excuse me if I got the name wrong). Both start with rape (well, in the case of Garp, that's pushing it, but the relationship is clearly intentional). Lots of clever stuff that might be interesting to think about... Is Garp so boring because his (boring) mom ascribes all the world's problems to "lust," which she understands about as well as the Victorians who put dresses on table legs? (I shouldn't demean the Victorians; they had it all over her.)

There's plenty of stuff that could be interesting. There's plenty of stuff that could be funny. There's even plenty of stuff that could be sexy. There's a scene that could be interesting, hilarious, and sexy, when Garp's mother hires a high-class Viennese prostitute to explain "lust." Since the prostitute doesn't speak English, and the mom doesn't speak German, Garp (who's just graduated from an exclusive prep school) has to translate. But this scene doesn't work any better than any of the others.

At the end of the day, Garp is a book about boring people being boring.

Though my life has felt rather full, time-wise, I did want to come back and say a little bit about how much I dug my first John Irving novel.

Though Dickensian is an oft-quoted descriptor, it fits The World According to Garp quite well. Aside from the eponymous lead, there's a sprawling cast that bounces all across the social, sexual, and political spectrum. There's a bevy of absurd situations that I had me eyebrow-raising at the novel's onset, but cherishing by the novel's end.

Though the novel follows T.S. Garp from cradle to grave, I was astonished by how easily Irving switches between characters, plots, and subplots in order to deliver a fully realized vision of Garp's world. Whether its the social commentary on extremism, the vilification of those who are intolerant, or a look at men's insecurities, Irving does a commendable job switching up subject even if they happen to orbit around the same themes. Indeed, though the novel goes in many different directions, it all feels thematically interconnected.

While thematically rich, I think it might be the writing and tone of the novel that struck me as most effective. I've rarely read a novel that so seamlessly slips from absurdist comedy to family tragedy without feeling like two different novels. Personally, by the time Garp leaves school for Vienna, I had full trust in whatever direction Irving wanted to steer me. The portions of the book that act as stories-within-stories (one of Garp's short stories and the first chapter of a novel) are exceptionally readable and help the main narrative pivot in its next direction. Luckily, the book is a pleasure to read: not too verbose, but rich in descriptive passages.

Overall, a really enjoyable and sumptuous novel. I thought Irving's commentary on sexual orientation, gender dysphoria, and gender discrimination was oddly woke for the time in which it was written. I'm sure a lot of the book wouldn't go over super well in today's climate, but I found it to be humanistic and thoughtful. This is the type of book that I would have loved to have studied in university, though I think it is a bit more appropriate and relevant as a more mature adult. It is also the type of book on which one could write endlessly, but I've got a lot more Irving in my future based on this book, so I'll cap it off there.

Finally, a big thanks to my wife on selecting this one for my birthday: she always seems to pick winners!


[4.5 Stars]

3.5
El mundo según Garp es una novela que no presenta un conflicto central que guíe la narración. Más bien, es un recorrido por la vida de un personaje. Así, si bien su vida está llena de acontecimientos conflictivos, no hay uno en particular que dispare la trama de la novela. La historia no empieza con este personaje, sino que pone el foco en su madre, que concibe a Garp en condiciones bastante particulares. El inicio atrapa mucho porque plantea una situación algo insólita que llama la atención e invita a continuar con la lectura.

Me gustó mucho cómo trabaja Irving las relaciones entre los personajes y la literatura. No solo Garp, que es escritor, sino su madre, por ejemplo, están atravesados por la literatura. De hecho, la novela en partes reproduce capítulos de esas novelas que escribe Garp, y muchas veces le dedica varias páginas a describir cómo alguno de esos escritos fue tomado por la crítica o por el círculo de conocidos del protagonista.

Hay momentos con más acción, otros más descriptivos. Tiene sus altibajos pero en general mantiene el ritmo, aunque ya hacia el final empezó a resultarme un poco repetitivo, ya un poco largo. Quizás le sobren varias páginas, aunque se trata de una lectura bastante entretenida y de lectura sencilla. Tiene un buen desarrollo de personajes (habría sido un gran problema que una novela de personajes no lo tuviera), que van evolucionando a medida que avanza la historia y el tiempo pasa. Me hubiera encantado que me gustara más, pero tal vez se trate de una cuestión de cómo determinados lectores conectan más con la novela, y otros lectores conectan menos. De todas maneras, me quedan ganas de encarar otros trabajos de John Irving.