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Sep 20, 2007

Nathan rated it:

I know I'm out on my own on this one, but I detest this book. I really think it glorifies whining to an extent never before seen in the human condition. Everyone I know loves this book, and I know I am in a minority here. But Christ... That this book is so popular with people in my age bracket and not so popular with people older or younger really makes me wonder if it is part of the problem or a reflection of the boring, whiny apathy of my generation. But if this book has any redeemable aspects More...

35 comments like (114 people liked it)

Dec 16, 2009

sarah rated it:

There are a lot of ways to judge people, but I find that opinion of this book is one of the most accurate and efficient. With very few exceptions, I've found that how much I like someone is strongly correlated with how much they enjoy the book. Is it their favorite book ever, omg? Well, they're probably either a best friend, a comrade whom I hold in worship-approximating esteem, or my cool cousin or uncle or something like that. Do they not "get" it or find it boring? You aren't my typ More...

11 comments like (87 people liked it)

Feb 10, 2012

Ian rated it:

A Whiff and a Sniff and I'm Off

Well, I finished and I'm glad I persisted.
You know how dogs sometimes sniff each other for ages before deciding to hump?
I was like that for a few years before I read the book, but more importantly I sniffed around ineffectually for the first 100 pages and could easily have blamed the book for my lack of engagement.
I read the last 300 pages in a couple of sittings.
I had to get on a roll.
But once you commit, the book pulls y More...

17 comments like (18 people liked it)

May 17, 2008

Michelle rated it:

I thought the book was ok. One of my old boyfriends recommended it to me, and while I was reading it I told him what an asshole I thought Ignatius J. Reilly was, and that I was sick of hearing about his valve. He got pissed off at me and told me that I didn't get it. He said Ignatius was a misunderstood genius stuck in a shitty town with no one who understood him. To be honest, my eyes kind of glazed over and I don't remember the rest of his rant, but I finished the book anyway. I think the most More...

29 comments like (55 people liked it)

Dec 17, 2009

Gregory rated it:

This so-called "farce" and "classic" was more frustrating to me than entertaining. I dislike leaving a book unfinished and the only reason I continued to read it was the hope that my effort would get paid off in the end. Alas, no such reward awaited me. This further cemented my belief that the only reason classics are called so is because some committee agreed and the public thought the committee must be right. I'm afraid my lingering disillusion with this book prevents my ab More...

4 comments like (30 people liked it)

Jan 15, 2008

Patrick rated it:

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here

4 comments like (27 people liked it)

Mar 20, 2009

Sarah rated it:

Dear Reader,

Fortuna evidently was smiling upon my being when I endeavored to undertake the consumption of this philosophical masterpiece. How amusing to stumble upon a comic homage to Boethius's Consolation of Philosophy, an homage that not only mirrors its source of inspiration in both content and structure, but moreover employs said source as a plot device of the most humorous kind. Certainly it was no mere accident; indeed it must have been a result of afflatus imparted by the god More...

14 comments like (65 people liked it)

Dec 17, 2009

Adam rated it:

People talk about this book a lot, and the story around its conception is one of those wonderful literary legends (genius unrecognised in his lifetime, manuscript submitted to random publisher by mother after his death, instant accolades for the latest Great American Novel, &c). So it's got a lot to prove right from the start.

Ignatius J. Reilly could easily have simply been a fat, grumpy, ignorant anti-hero, but there's something about the depth and complexity of the characterisatio More...

0 comments like (25 people liked it)

Jun 25, 2010

mp rated it:

One fine morning Fortuna spun my wheel of luck and put me on a flight to NYC. The guy who was sitting next to me, refusing to indulge in modern day perversities like movies or music, pulled out his book and sat down reading. He must have been enjoying it immensely, because he kept laughing out loud every now and then. Pretty soon he realized that some people had started turning around to give him weird looks. Poor guy didn't have an option but to put the book down. But Fortuna, being the degener More...

10 comments like (30 people liked it)

Dec 29, 2007

Mary Catherine rated it:

I hated this book. I almost gave up after the first 20 pages, but I decided to stick with it and give it a chance. Wrong. My first instinct was correct!

The only thing that might have saved this for me was if the main character Ignatius faced a long, slow, painful death. There was absolutely nothing about him that I found redeeming or appealing. Has there ever been a more annoying, obnoxious character in literature? If so, I don't want to know.

I had heard that this was s More...

4 comments like (40 people liked it)

Nov 15, 2007

Lisa rated it:

There is no denying that this book is funny. It's funny in a dated, written-in-the-60s-in-the-South way, but still just classic comic set-ups and timing -- it all ties together perfectly, and I really appreciate that. I guess my main problem with the book is I didn't find it to be anything other than hilariously funny and mildly offensive (women are drunks or nags or both! women activists are fools!). Everything I hear about this book is how funny but deeply sad and moving it is. No.

More...

1 comment like (13 people liked it)

Dec 17, 2009

Steve rated it:

Am I being unduly harsh giving this a mere “It’s OK”? Maybe. To hear some people describe it (even people I usually correlate well with), this book is a laugh-scream riot. Hopes grow even higher when you hear the story about Toole’s mother who, after his suicide, finally gets the thing published, then sits back to watch the prizes pour in. What I viewed as a miss may have been because the bar was so high. It could be, too, that I’m just not predisposed to dysfunctional characters, all bloat More...

22 comments like (16 people liked it)

Nov 28, 2007

Joe rated it:

What a colossal waste of my life. Nothing happens. Literally. That's what's wrong with this book. It's a freshman-level fiction workshop gone horribly awry. And it won what?

4 comments like (24 people liked it)

Apr 01, 2008

Nathan rated it:

A weird and wonderful book. Truly, I've never read anything like it. This novel has some of the crispest, most well-painted characters I've ever read, and although I wasn't "laughing out loud" as much as the reviewers on the back cover promised, it is definitely funny as hell, and a completely cringe-worthy story. The character of Ignatius Reilly will haunt me. We all know people like this -- the over-educated, miserable, socially dysfunctional outcast who is so cut off from the world More...

3 comments like (20 people liked it)

Dec 16, 2009

Conrad rated it:

Ugh. Most overrated book ever. What a smug pile of overripe garbage.

15 comments like (22 people liked it)

May 15, 2008

Mary rated it:

A Confederacy of Dunces is a great comedic book with tremendous amount of detail that makes the reader feel as if they are actually set in the 1950s and standing on Canal Street, at the heart of New Orleans. John Kennedy Toole creates a believable scene, with landmarks such as Bay St. Louis, St. Louis Cathedral and real streets such as Canal St. and St. Charles Ave. These landmarks create a sense of comfort for readers who are familiar of the region. Toole was inspired by his own life while writ More...

1 comment like (10 people liked it)

Dec 12, 2011

Paul rated it:

Authors who commit suicide find their Lovelybones-eye view from the afterlife brings them no comfort:

John Kennedy Toole : Oh my God, if I'd only persevered for another year or so, I'd have been rich! Famous! Women would have wanted to sleep with me, maybe! Look at those sales figures! I'm so miserable! If there was only a way to commit suicide again up here again... but there isn't....

B S Johnson : Put a sock in it - your situation is, admittedly, redolent of a sublime ir More...

34 comments like (10 people liked it)

Dec 16, 2009

ally rated it:

i think i'm one of the few people in this world who didn't like this book. i really tried to read it, my dad and sister just raved about it - but i found myself bored and annoyed. it's one thing to not like characters b/c the author wrote them so brilliantly you actually have an emotional response to them, whether it be positive or negative, but with this book, i was just bored and didn't care about the characters. It was actually painful to read past one point. I absolutely could not read past More...

2 comments like (12 people liked it)

Dec 17, 2009

Brandon rated it:

After hearing dozens of great things about 'A Confederacy of Dunces,' I figured I had to read it. And upon my third attempt at reading it, I did finish it. And I realized that I did not like it at all. There are a handful of humorous pages, but you have to suffer through 70 pages of tripe per one page of decency. Don't let the Pulitzer fool you. The only reason this novel was published was because the author killed himself because he couldn't publish it, and then his mother repeatedly sent it to More...

1 comment like (10 people liked it)

Mar 07, 2008

Austin rated it:

I'll be honest: A Confederacy Of Dunces probably didn't deserve a Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.

There, I said it.

BUT, this does not mean that you shouldn't read it, nor does that mean that it isn't as good as advertised, or that this is because of any deficiency in Toole's writing. This book is funny; probably funnier than most anything else you can find written by a dead Southern Writer who was never popular during his own lifetime.

For those who have neve More...

0 comments like (9 people liked it)

Jan 16, 2008

Eric rated it:

Quick, funny, engrossing, but am I the only one who felt the book could use a little "more"? Criticizing Toole seems to anger his fans and be somewhat akin to spitting on his tragically-departed soul, but even without my own Pulitzer I feel I can still point to certain areas and ask, "Whaaa?"

The characters are distinct and entertaining but not necessarily well-developed or understood. At times some just strike me as functional. It seems a shame because so many of More...

1 comment like (7 people liked it)

Aug 09, 2008

Joan rated it:

Many claim it is the most valid depiction of New Orleanians ever. My favorite quote comes from Ignatius's extremely short tenure as a college teacher: "I could never have possibly read over the illiteracies and misconceptions burbling from the dark minds of those students. It will be the same wherever I work."
This from a professor who did not need to read the papers to know the most appropriate usage of them was to dump them "out of the window and right onto the students' h More...

0 comments like (9 people liked it)

Dec 17, 2009

Clear_enGlish rated it:

You great kook Mr. Toole.
Ignatius J. Reilly hit my world and went off like a "nucular bum"! The fallout is still in the air.
I wish we had been magnificent enough for you to stay, you left before we even got to know you; disappearing into the night like that... If only things had been different.
Since meeting Ignatius, you may like to know that Fortuna has spun my wheel again, this time I feel the cycle is definitely on the up!
I really appreciate this book.

1 comment like (9 people liked it)

Jan 31, 2008

Amanda rated it:

Hate, hate, hate this whole book. But I think I'm supposed to hate it--like the author actually wanted me to abhor the protagonist. Ignatius is gross. But I felt sorry for him in the end. Which makes ME feel gross. Ick. Blah. Hate it!

9 comments like (10 people liked it)

Jun 20, 2008

Laura rated it:

Easily the funniest book I’ve ever read. A masterful fugue of high and low comedy, the novel traces the exploits of Ignatius J. Reilly, thwarted author, philosopher, and medievalist, as he is tragically forced to divert energy from the writing of his magnum opus — a comparative history that will astonish a benighted world — in order to get a job. Interlaced through Ignatius’s epic employment journey (including stints as a hot dog vendor and filing clerk) is a cast of New Orleans eccentrics teete More...

0 comments like (13 people liked it)

May 12, 2008

Jordan rated it:

Before reading A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole my favorite novel thus far had to have been J.D. Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye. Mr. Toole’s novel is full of vigor and life, quite an ironic statement being as how Mr. Toole took his own life at the relatively youthful age of thirty-two. A Confederacy of Dunces best fits into the category/genre of intellectual satire. Mr. Toole’s bold genius is quite prevalent throughout the narrative as he attacks his present, the 60’s, with Ignatius More...

0 comments like (4 people liked it)

Feb 13, 2009

Mindy rated it:

Final review: (Until I read it again, and oh I WILL read it again!) I LOVE this book. I love the New Orleans of it. I love the brutal satire. I love the sexuality of it that I didn't really pay attention to the first time I read it. And funny, my gawd, it's funny. And sad. And sweet. And inuriating. Just brilliant. What a great loss is Toole. Is there a biography of him? I'd really like to read that.

Feb 2009: Getting to reread this one now thanks to Sally! Yay!

May 2008: T More...

17 comments like (7 people liked it)

Dec 29, 2007

Mister Jones rated it:

One of the few books I've read twice or is it three times? There's just something about Ignatius that makes me rip a gut muscle laughing, and yes there's a tragedy to it all, but the humor wins out. The various characters and Ignatius's encounters with them, all make for a great novel. Hell, I love it.

Plus, I find the whole story of Toole and how the novel reached publication to be interesting.

1 comment like (6 people liked it)

Mar 30, 2008

Kiersten added it

This book sort of made me hate people... more.

0 comments like (11 people liked it)

Jan 18, 2012

Shane rated it:

Ignatius J. Reilly is certainly one of literature’s unforgettable characters, and so are many of the supporting cast of this farcical morality play, written by a writer who committed suicide in his 32nd year, winning the Pulitzer posthumously.

Ignatius, a self-proclaimed genius, is lazy, opinionated, hypochondriacal, idealistic, flatulent and sexually scared, content to relieve himself with solo performances in his room. He is unemployed (and unemployable), lives in New Orleans with h More...

4 comments like (3 people liked it)

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