[.ca] A Confederacy of Dunces (ISBN 0808519190)

From Amazon.com:
"A green hunting cap squeezed the top of the fleshy balloon of a head. The green earflaps, full of large ears and uncut hair and the fine bristles that grew in the ears themselves, stuck out on either side like turn signals indicating two directions at once. Full, pursed lips protruded beneath the bushy black moustache and, at their corners, sank into little folds filled with disapproval and potato chip crumbs." Meet Ignatius J. Reilly, the hero of John Kennedy Toole's tragicomic tale, A Confederacy of Dunces. This 30-year-old medievalist lives at home with his mother in New Orleans, pens his magnum opus on Big Chief writing pads he keeps hidden under his bed, and relays to anyone who will listen the traumatic experience he once had on a Greyhound Scenicruiser bound for Baton Rouge. ("Speeding along in that bus was like hurtling into the abyss.") But Ignatius's quiet life of tyrannizing his mother and writing his endless comparative history screeches to a halt when he is almost arrested by the overeager Patrolman Mancuso--who mistakes him for a vagrant--and then involved in a car accident with his tipsy mother behind the wheel. One thing leads to another, and before he knows it, Ignatius is out pounding the pavement in search of a job. Over the next several hundred pages, our hero stumbles from one adventure to the next. His stint as a hotdog vendor is less than successful, and he soon turns his employers at the Levy Pants Company on their heads. Ignatius's path through the working world is populated by marvelous secondary characters: the stripper Lana Lee and her talented cockatoo; the septuagenarian secretary Miss Trixie, whose desperate attempts to retire are constantly, comically thwarted; gay blade Dorian Greene; sinister Miss Lee, proprietor of the Night of Joy nightclub; and Myrna Minkoff, the girl Ignatius loves to hate. The many subplots that weave through A Confederacy of Dunces are as complicated as anything you'll find in a Dickens novel, and just as beautifully tied together in the end. But it is Ignatius--selfish, domineering, and deluded, tragic and comic and larger than life--who carries the story. He is a modern-day Quixote beset by giants of the modern age. His fragility cracks the shell of comic bluster, revealing a deep streak of melancholy beneath the antic humor. John Kennedy Toole committed suicide in 1969 and never saw the publication of his novel. Ignatius Reilly is what he left behind, a fitting memorial to a talented and tormented life. --Alix Wilber

Comic New Orleans, if you can believe that now:
What a time capsule this novel is: Set in pre-Katrina New Orleans---loooong before that, it is a perfect-pitched novel of the city, capturing the rollicking good times and oddness that the place is--or was. I love anything Southern, but especially literature, and "Confederacy" read like a cross between "Bark of the Dogwood" and one of Vonnegut's books, say, "Slaughter House Five." It's a shame that Toole never lived to see how many people have come to love this book. For THAT,I recommend "The Neon Bible" if you want more of the author. Must also recommend the novels "Katzenjammer" by McCrae, and "Secret Life of Bees" by Sue Monk Kidd.

wacky silly stuff, plus some wistfulness:
A classic story that makes me a bit sad to think about considering that the author died young and by his own hand. Given American culture, that may be part of the appeal of the book to many. By any standard, however, this is a great book, with highly memorable, vividly described characters, none more so than the central figure Ignatius, a likeable, eccentric oaf. His part-time sidekick, Myrna Minkoff, is also a hoot, and I like it when the two of them gang up. Although it's in many ways a timeless story, the manner of speaking of the characters is probably representative of the times (1950s?). Given the short life of the author, the book has a bit of a tragic backdrop that affected my feelings for it, and the New Orleans setting with Katrina occuring a few years ago may now also affect my memories of it. Author of Adjust Your Brain: A Practical Theory for Maximizing Mental Health.

Truly Outrageous And Great Outsider Novel:
I'll say this. This novel is quite unlike any other. It's nonconformist to the core, well written and very funny. Now, when I say funny I mean oddball funny, weird funny. The protagonist's love for his dog was really pushing the envelope I thought (that will make sense once you read the novel). This is truly an amazing book. Be patient ... allow yourself to adjust to the author and his comic world-view and you'll be greatly rewarded. Highly recommended. It deserves its cult status. Truly a unique comic novel, now easily one of my top 5 favorites. Pick up a copy!

Great book:
One of the funniest books I've read. I've recommended it to people and they either love it, or can't get through the first chapter.

Eccentricity Defined:
With all due respect, reviewers focussing on the 'racist' humour of this novel are entirely missing the point. Without playing plot spoiler, it's clear from the outset, and never becomes ambiguous, what an eccentric and largely (literally and figuratively, in the case of the main character)loathesome cast of characters are in play. Ignatius is remarkably vile, entirely dependent upon his mother, vindictive - and just ugly enough a person to be a remarkable feat of farce. The whole cast of characters is flawed in ways that make them viable as real people, and not just creatures of the page. It's remarkable to me that this has never been made a film, which I would see in an instant. Highly recommended.