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A Lie about My Father
He had his final heart attack in the Silver Band Club in Corby, somewhere between the bar and the cigarette machine. A foundling; a fantasist; a morose, threatening drinker who was quick with his hands, he hadn't seen his son for years. And for all those years the two estranged men had been falling - each at their own pace - towards their own vanishing points.
John Burnside...more
John Burnside...more
Paperback, 336 pages
Published
March 1st 2007
by Vintage
(first published March 2nd 2006)
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This is a wonderful book. Honest, moving and magical. He never goes for cheap laughs, he never spins out an anecdote to make himself look good or his father look bad, he doesn't deal in self pity or in easy cliches, you sense that this is a painfully honest trawl for some sort of truth. i love John Burnside's poetry and i love his prose, an example, "...you learn to love yourself by loving the world around you. Because what we love in ourselves is ourselves loving."
This book was a great read. The author was very personal and he let the reader take part in his very private thoughts, his anger and hate. His writing was flawless and awesome. This was my first book by John Burnside but I will certainly read more of his work because he uses such great metaphors and his narrative is written flowingly.
This was one of my Scottish themed books purchased for last Summer's Highlands Adventure. The first chapter held great promise that was only minimally filled by the following chapters. I was interested by the memoir of a young boy's relationship with his father and its lasting impact. Yet, I felt the last few chapters strayed through self-satisfying journeys and the wrap-up provided only a quick nod to the new father-son dynamic.
The introduction is far more promising than the rest of the book. Some descriptions are really vague even if they go on for some pages. Yet, it is interesting to see how the the father character is developed, even if it seems to be close to some clichés.
This is recommended for those seeking the quintessential evil father memoir. The father in this case is an alcoholic, a deadbeat and a Scottish hardman who mistreats his wife and son. The son (the author) then goes on a rebellious rampage of alcohol, sex and drugs. This culminates in a long spate of mental illness.
Uplifting? No. However, Burnside utilises a very poetic and compelling turn of phrase throughout, which lifts the antics from the potential whirlpool of navelgazing. He has a remarkabl...more
Uplifting? No. However, Burnside utilises a very poetic and compelling turn of phrase throughout, which lifts the antics from the potential whirlpool of navelgazing. He has a remarkabl...more
Wenn man auf den ersten 40 Seiten an zwei Tagen hintereinander einschläft, sollte man lieber mit einem anderen Buch anfangen.
Do dysfunctional families make the best memoirs? Are happy, normal families bad fodder instead?
This one i read in french, so I have no excuses...
This man, (Burnside) writes like an angel. Or, the poet that he is. It's a memoir, and I will read anything he writes. Try him. You won't be sorry.
Nov 12, 2008
Michele
rated it
5 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
2008,
marybel-recommends
This book is imbued with sadness and regret but still,at the end,you are uplifted with something a little like hope and even forgiveness.
Très joli "roman". Pas facile d'abord toutefois, on a du mal à accrocher sur certaines parties je trouve (en particulier la 2e partie)
Shameless plug for my advisor! A great read, a little disturbing.
Mar 02, 2013
Mellow Pages Library
added it
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review of another edition
Shelves:
on-our-shelf,
d-spencer
Jan 26, 2013
sisterimapoet
marked it as to-read
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John Burnside is the author of nine collections of poetry and five works of fiction. Burnside has achieved wide critical acclaim, winning the Whitbread Poetry Award in 2000 for The Asylum Dance which was also shortlisted for the Forward and T. S. Eliot prizes. Born in Scotland, he moved away in 1965, returning to settle there in 1995. In the intervening period he worked as a factory hand, a labour...more
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“My father was one of those men who sit in a room and you can feel it: the simmer, the sense of some unpredictable force that might, at any moment, break loose, and do something terrible. [Burnside, p. 27]”
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12 people liked it
“He lied all the time even when there was no need to lie [...] He needed a _history_, a sense of self. [Burnside on his father, p. 22]”
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4 people liked it
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