List Books During Barney's Version
| Original Title: | Barney's Version |
| ISBN: | 0701162724 (ISBN13: 9780701162726) |
| Edition Language: | English |
| Literary Awards: | Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal (1998), Scotiabank Giller Prize (1997), Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Best Book in Caribbean and Canada (1998), Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize Nominee (1997), Jewish Quarterly-Wingate Prize Nominee for Fiction (1998) Premi Llibreter de narrativa for Altres literatures (2013) |
Mordecai Richler
Hardcover | Pages: 416 pages Rating: 4.15 | 9547 Users | 688 Reviews
Be Specific About Based On Books Barney's Version
| Title | : | Barney's Version |
| Author | : | Mordecai Richler |
| Book Format | : | Hardcover |
| Book Edition | : | Anniversary Edition |
| Pages | : | Pages: 416 pages |
| Published | : | September 25th 1997 by Chatto & Windus (first published 1997) |
| Categories | : | Fiction. Cultural. Canada. Contemporary |
Narrative In Pursuance Of Books Barney's Version
Before his brain began to shrink, Barney Panofsky clung to two cherished beliefs. Life was absurd, and nobody truly understood anybody else. Even his friends tend to agree that Barney is a 'wife-abuser, an intellectual fraud, a purveyor of pap, a drunk with a penchant for violence and probably a murderer'. But when his sworn enemy threatens to publish this calumny, Barney is driven to write his own memoirs, rewinding the spool of his life, editing, selecting and plagiarising, as his memory plays tricks on him - and on the reader. Ebullient and perverse, he has seen off 3 wives - the enigmatic Clara, whom he drove to suicide in Paris in 1952; the garrulous Second Mrs Panofsky; and finally Miriam who stayed married to him for decades before running off with a sober academic. Houdini-like, Barney slides from crisis to success, from lowlife to highlife in Montreal, Paris and London, his outrageous expolits culminating in the scandal he carries around like a humpback - the murder charge that he goes on denying to the end.Rating Based On Books Barney's Version
Ratings: 4.15 From 9547 Users | 688 ReviewsWrite Up Based On Books Barney's Version
This 1997 classic creates a lasting and indelible tragicomic character, Barney Panofsky, who stands with other larger-than-life figures who arise so vitally out of comparably sweeping fictional autobiographies, such as Saul Bellows Augie March, Richard Russos Sully Sullivan, and Richard Fords Frank Bascombe. The prose and dialogue was pitch perfect, and the tales satire of human foibles ranges from a vicious slicing up of fools high and low to poignant or slapstick self-deprecation. The bookSaw the movie today, loved it, and immediately added to book to my to-read list. I usually like the book more than the film, but we'll see. My to-read list has become so long that I'll never be able to die.
4.5Lots to say but will save for book club
Barney's Version is Richler's Giller Prize winning version of Saul Bellow's National Book Award winning classic, Herzog. A good, at times better, Canadian cover version of an American favorite. So you think Kids in the Hall and Saturday Night Live. So you think Barenaked Ladies and, I dunno, Creed. Yes. Fine. Fine. So be it. It's about Barney Panofsky. Panofsky, a man with, oy, troubles of his own, let me tell you, sonny, but does he let that get him down? No. No, he doesn't let that get him
This book is so funny at some parts I almost fell down laughing in the subway reading it - no easy feat as it is quite crowded in there and Torontonians are disgruntled by the sound of unbridled joy in others.He has so many extra little jokes in it, from the footnotes later added to Barney's manuscript by his perfectionist son, to the impact of Barney's fading memory, to how he feels about Toronto and Canadian culture. It is packed with Richler's intelligent and at times eviscerating sense of
Mordecai Richler's novels constitutea national treasure. He belonged to the Jewish community of Montreal which is city divided between English and French speakers. Mordecai Richler spent his career mercilessly lampooning the follies of all three groups. Richler certainly always kept me laughing but I am so close to his concerns I am not quite sure what the nature of his appeal is outside of Canada. Barney's Version contains an eloquent statement of the dominant points of Richler's literary opus
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