I was not ready for this book. I wasn't ready for the backstory of its author, John Kennedy Toole, a victim of suicide eleven years before his book found its way to publication through the efforts of his mother who discovered the manuscript after his passing. I wasn't ready for the humour, especially after being warned in a foreword that this book was funny, which immediately sets me up in a "prove it" mindset (it did prove it).
Frankly, and this is a little cynical on my part, but I don't think it's wrong, I get a little suspicious about those heaping praise placed on posthumous work of any kind because I can't help but wonder how much of it is sympathetic. For this book to win the Pulitzer Prize, for example, almost seems like a noble gesture.
Except, I feel like this is the kind of book that, had it been published in Toole's lifetime and been lost in the shuffle, somebody would have found it, been bowled over by it, passed it on to a friend, and that would be the start of another path to notoriety.
I've also since read about the troubled history of trying to bring this novel to the screen, and the tragedies that have also left those efforts reeling (John Belushi and Chris Farley are among those slated to have played Ignatius) is a wild story in itself.
It's an easy first read because it just keeps moving and it really is fun and funny. I look forward to returning to it sometime for a more leisurely take.
No comments:
Post a Comment