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The Tragedy of Arthur

by Arthur Phillips (Goodreads Author)

3.59 · rating details · 755 ratings · 253 reviews

The Tragedy of Arthur is an emotional and elaborately constructed tour de force from bestselling and critically acclaimed novelist Arthur Phillips, “one of the best writers in America” (The Washington Post).

Its doomed hero is Arthur Phillips, a young man struggling with a larger-than-life father, a con artist who works wonders of deception but is a most unreliable parent....more

Hardcover, 368 pages

Published April 19th 2011 by Random House (first published 2010)

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The Tragedy of Arthur
by Arthur Phillips (Goodreads Author)

Release date: Feb 21, 2012

The Tragedy of Arthur is an emotional and elaborately constructed tour de force from “one of the best writers in America” (The Washington Post). Its d…more

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Oct 30, 2011

Jason rated it

Shelves: fiction, novel

Arthur Phillips is our most reliable creator of unreliable narrators. And in the case of this book, it is "Arthur Phillips" himself who narrates. That is the "Arthur Phillips" who is the author of Prague, The Egyptologist, Angelica, The Song Is You, as well as the discoverer of what may be a newly discovered Shakespeare play: The Tragedy of Arthur.

The book begins with a short preface from "Random House", followed by an Introduction to the newly discovered play by "...moreArthur Phillips is our most reliable creator of unreliable narrators. And in the case of this book, it is "Arthur Phillips" himself who narrates. That is the "Arthur Phillips" who is the author of Prague, The Egyptologist, Angelica, The Song Is You, as well as the discoverer of what may be a newly discovered Shakespeare play: The Tragedy of Arthur.

The book begins with a short preface from "Random House", followed by an Introduction to the newly discovered play by "Arthur Phillips," and then the "Shakespeare" play itself, complete with the standard apparatus of footnotes one expects with Shakespeare. The Introduction is 250 pages long and is essentially a self-contained memoir of how Phillips came to get the Shakespeare manuscript from his father, a genial forger with a penchant for creating wonders, why he initially thought it was genuine and brought it to Random House, and how he eventually came to doubt its legitimacy -- despite mounting and overwhelming evidence from a wide range of experts that the manuscript was genuine.

The Introduction is one part fabulous invention, one part a hilarious riff on Shakespeare studies and the claim that Shakespeare did not write his works, one part a serious discussion of the relationship of art and authorship, and one part a deeply affecting story of a family and its growth. Although it is all not wrapped up nearly as elegantly as The Egyptologist or The Song is You, the individual parts are superior.

Like Pale Fire, but in reverse order, The Tragedy of Arthur includes the entire, uninterrupted play that is the subject of the bulk of the book. Although the novel itself falls short of Pale Fire (which says little), the "original document" itself is much a much more ambitious enterprise: what is meant to be or not to be, so to speak, a complete five act Shakespeare play about the King Arthur. Unlike the poem that prefaces Pale Fire, the play itself is readable and worth reading, a pastiche of the Shakespeare histories, reaching close to the level of the worst of them. The sometimes dueling footnotes between "Arthur Phillips" and the Random House editors are not to be missed.

Overall, another completely original work from Arthur Phillips,(less)

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Jan 02, 2012

Emily Leathers rated it

Recommends it for: readers who have enjoyed other Arthur Phillips novels

Recommended to Emily by: First Reads

Shelves: first-reads

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. After reading the preface, I decided to do what was suggested: skip to the back of the book and read the play, and then return to the 'Introduction' (which is actually the meat of the book). This turned out to be a good idea for me for two reasons: (1) since it clearly *is* the case that this play was written by the character's father to describe their lives, knowing it's contents provides a few interesting connections while reading the introduction, and (2) it seems that I enjoy Shakespeare's ...more

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May 08, 2011

Becky added it

Arthur Phillips is a novelist, the author, most recently, of the novels The Song is You and Angelica. He is also both the author of the novel The Tragedy of Arthur and, metafictionally, its main character and narrator as well. Both are from from Minnesota. Arthur, the character is married to an Eastern European supermodel, twin to bipolar lesbian Dana, and son to Arthur senior, a failed painter, often-caught forger and general conman with a deep and abiding love of Shakespeare, who has spent mos...moreArthur Phillips is a novelist, the author, most recently, of the novels The Song is You and Angelica. He is also both the author of the novel The Tragedy of Arthur and, metafictionally, its main character and narrator as well. Both are from from Minnesota. Arthur, the character is married to an Eastern European supermodel, twin to bipolar lesbian Dana, and son to Arthur senior, a failed painter, often-caught forger and general conman with a deep and abiding love of Shakespeare, who has spent most of Arthur's life in prison. Early in Arthur and Dana's life, when their father was still home more than he was incarcerated, he worked hard to instill in the twins his own love for the bard. Dana took to Shakespeare like the actor she would become, Arthur not so much. Arthur, in fact, will spend his whole life resentful of what his father has done and skeptical of all the things he cares about.

Late in his father's life, just before he is to be released from prison for the last time, he gives Arthur a gift of sorts. He hands him the means of obtaining a centuries-lost unknown play by Shakespeare called The Tragedy of Arthur, which came into his possession illegally fifty years earlier, when he'd been working as a painter "duplicating" paintings at an estate in England. He wants Arthur to have his publisher, Random House, authenticate and publish the play. Arthur is skeptical, but also yearns to believe his father has finally done something worthwhile. He tentatively comes to the conclusion that the work is genuine, especially when a preponderance of Shakespearean scholars and other experts give their blessing to the project. But that belief is short-lived; he knows his father, and ultimately comes to believe that this play is the biggest con of his father's life.

Meanwhile, Arthur's own life is no comedy in which all's well that ends well. His marriage is going down the tubes, critics find him sometimes boring and often pretentious, and he's in love with his sister's lover.

Most of the novel The Tragedy of Arthur consists of the character Arthur Phillips's introduction to the Random House publication of the play. It is 256 pages of memoir, hand-wringing, whining, blame casting, and trying to convince potential readers of the play that it is indeed a forgery. It's glorious. Shakespeare, despite Arthur's detestation of his work, is everywhere, in quotations, biographical references, and parallels to contemporary life. The last 100 and some pages contain the text of the play which in my not very well educated opinion reads pretty much like one of Shakespeare's own. Often funny and always smart, The Tragedy of Arthur is an erudite tour de force. (less)

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Jan 15, 2012

Jeanne Thornton rated it

I knew I would like Arthur Phillips as an author from the moment I read the opening of Prague, involving the game "Sincerity" (RULES, as I remember them: five players, a social setting. Each player makes five statements about one or more of the other players, as though in a normal conversation. Only one of those five statements can be true. At the end, players try to determine which statements are true and which are lies.) This is a man with a wonderful eye for the sick contortions the...more

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Dec 15, 2011

Scott rated it

From the openning disclaimer from Random House to the point/counterpoint endnotes, this book was remarkable. Arthur Phillips wove themes throughout this book and the accompanying play that touched on the importance of reality and being right, the need for wonder and enchantment in our lives, and the importance of believing in someone. I have to admit that I was disappointed when the 'preface' ended and the play began, because I wanted to stay with the character of Arthur Phillips and his twin a...more

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Dec 07, 2011

Julie rated it

Where for art thou Arthur Phillips? I wisht that I had you here by my elbow's grace to explain the last fifth of the book and to see if my reading the rest even counts. I am one of those acutely ashamed well read literature freaks who has never read a Shakespeare play. Alas I hope I didn't miss the barge. I was petrified to read this. I didn't understand his first novel Prague and never felt up to trying his other stuff even though we share the same hometown and I knew he was a 5 time jeopardy ...more

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Nov 08, 2011

Kristin Strong rated it

"The Tragedy of Arthur" loses a star because I had to read a "Shakespeare" play after finishing the book. I'm a complainer like that. Not that reading the play is essential to one's enjoyment or comprehension of the book, but I sort of felt a duty to carry the task out to its fullest extent.

The book is set up as the introduction to a new Shakespeare play discovered, preserved and passed down to the author by his con-artist father. The author moves through his c...more

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Oct 27, 2011

Beesley rated it

Shelves: book-group

Good book, well written, enjoyable, and thought provoking. Shakespeare pervades this book, so it is probably mostly of interest to those who like Shakespeare or are at least interested in Shakespeare.

There were some things about this book I did not like: 1) I found the first chunk of it very rough going because I hated the narrator and thought he was whiney. In fact, the narrator uses that word, "whine," more than once about himself, possibly three times or more. Tellin...moreGood book, well written, enjoyable, and thought provoking. Shakespeare pervades this book, so it is probably mostly of interest to those who like Shakespeare or are at least interested in Shakespeare.

There were some things about this book I did not like: 1) I found the first chunk of it very rough going because I hated the narrator and thought he was whiney. In fact, the narrator uses that word, "whine," more than once about himself, possibly three times or more. Telling. Around the time the narrator went to college, things picked up and I became more interested and less annoyed. 2) The narrator spent a lot of time showing us instead of tellng us, especially showing off his knowledge of Shakespeare. In addition to repeatedly presenting situations easily recognizable as "Shakespearean," the narrator then took the additional step of identifying the specific play that the where a similar situation ensued. This had the effect of the narrator and the writer showing off in their letters, striving to continually be the smartest guys at the cocktail party. I would have enjoyed thinking about this on my own. 3) ***POSSIBLE SPOILER ALERT - POSSIBLY NOT SO MUCH, BUT IN AN EXCESS OF CAUTION, SKIP THIS IF YOU REALLY HATE SPOILERS***The convicted forger father insists that the narrator concoct a story about how the manuscript at the center of the tale was found, on the grounds that if anyone knew it came from the hands of a convicted forger, no one would take the manuscript. In this age of instant information about anyone, any idiot could have connected the narrator to his forger father pretty fast. Anyone wanting to seriously test the manuscript's origins could have figured this out in no time. This was a completely implausible plot point that didn't hold up. I know, I know, this book is a story about stories, an elaborate ruse about elaborate ruses, but since the writer went to great lengths to make other elements of the plot seemingly plausible, I was disappointed by this. 4) What happened to the narrator at the end of the book seemed way out of proportion to his purported misdeeds. The characters who punished him showed their own unspeakable moral shabbiness - another disappointment because they were otherwise interesting and funny characters. Made me appreciate Shakespeare's skill in this area all the more. When somebody is punished in Shakespeare, there is no question about proportion. (less)

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Oct 17, 2011

Christopher rated it

Shelves: favorites

Like Mr. Phillips, I have never been much of a Shakespeare fan even though I count "Macbeth" as one of my favorite works. But, in this utterly unique and engaging novel, Mr. Phillips rekindles a love of Shakespeare as well as deepens some of the mystery surrounding the Bard. The premise of the book, without giving too much of the story away, is that Mr. Phillips' father, a small-time con artist with a love of Shakespeare, "discovers" a long-lost play of the Bard's and asks hi...more

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Sep 12, 2011

Robert E. Kennedy Library rated it

I was afraid this one would be too gimmicky for me, when I read that Phillips had used the trendoid ploy of creating a main character named Arthur Phillips, who is also an author. But the plot sucked me in enough that I stopped caring where Arthur Phillips the author left off and Arthur Phillips the character began. Phillips has created a triangle: Arthur Phillips the character, his twin sister Dana, and their shady father, who's in and out of prison for forgery and other petty crimes. Dana and ...moreI was afraid this one would be too gimmicky for me, when I read that Phillips had used the trendoid ploy of creating a main character named Arthur Phillips, who is also an author. But the plot sucked me in enough that I stopped caring where Arthur Phillips the author left off and Arthur Phillips the character began. Phillips has created a triangle: Arthur Phillips the character, his twin sister Dana, and their shady father, who's in and out of prison for forgery and other petty crimes. Dana and her father are Shakespeare fanatics; Arthur is not, so he spends his youth as odd man out, excluded from their William Shakespeare admiration society. Arthur's bard fatigue made me identify with him: I often get restless watching the tragedies. I know everyone's going to wind up dead, could we just wrap it up and get on with our lives?

But the balance between the three characters changes in the second half of the book. Arthur's father entrusts him with what he claims to be the only copy of an unknown play by Shakespeare. Heartbreakingly, Arthur finally feels like he's earned his father's love, since the elder Phillips trusts him to use his connections as a writer to get it published. But knowing his father as he does, Arthur begins to wonder if he's being had: certain passages sound like they could have been written by his dad, and there's a character with the same name as the family dog. He's in an impossible situation. If he abandons the project, he'll alienate his sister and deny his family a good deal of money. If he goes through with it, and it IS a fraud, he'll trash his own literary reputation. This dilemma keeps the plot moving -- until you're faced with reading the supposed play, to which the first 250 pages of the story are just an introduction. The play, heavily footnoted by Arthur and by numerous Shakespeare scholars was, at least for me, a long slog. But after the build-up, there was no way I could skip reading it. Probably readers who love Shakespeare would find this part of the book more engaging than I did.

edited by Kennedy Library staff member Jan K.
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Sep 06, 2011

Verena rated it

Deception is the theme of this book. The narrator’s father, Arthur Phillips, has spent his adult life creating large and small fakes, everything from Old Masters’ paintings to discount coupons and spending many years in prison as a result. This has soured his relationship with his two children, twins who have lived with the burden of a father they love and despise. They are devoted to each other but have opposite reactions to their father’s life. Dana shares his love of Shakespeare and can accep...more

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Jul 20, 2011

Eliza rated it

Shelves: novel

7/20/2011: A very clever novel. It plays with all sorts of literary ideas and issues, including narration (mostly unreliable), expectations, and reputation. It plays with all sorts of Shakespearean themes, plots, and questions, as the protagonist (and the reader) struggle with the assertion posed by another character--are we all just living out lives that were first created and written by Shakespeare?

Layers of Arthurs make it easy to draw all the parallels that the author and/or na...more

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Jul 07, 2011

Jim rated it

I read the "Introduction" and skipped most of the actual play. I read the first few scenes and realized that I wasn't in the mood for Shakespeare, even fake Shakespeare, unless I'm watching a performance. I still skimmed the play a bit and while I couldn't get into the actual play, the notes were really interesting. I loved the bit where Arthur recognizes an older term that his dad used in a brief stint as a football commentator, a job he didn't hold for long because his prime audience...more

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Jul 01, 2011

Gregory S. rated it

I sort of stumbled onto this book by accident. I needed to test my new e-reader's capacity to check out book from the public library, and this was the book I chose for that test.

Unless you're a Serious Shakespeare Geek, this book sounds appalling. It's about an alleged previously unknown play by Shakespeare...or maybe it's about an alleged fraud perpetrated by a Serious Shakespeare Geek. It's about verifying the provenance of that play, based on stylistic details and esoteric referenc...more

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May 27, 2011

Simon rated it

When I reviewed Arthur Phillips's last novel The Song Is You, I faulted Phillips for filtering the central relationship (a love affair that never quite happens) through a series of moments that felt a little more sentimentalized than actually lived. In the new The Tragedy of Arthur Phillips takes a sharp left turn into the personal by way of metafiction. What we are reading is supposedly Phillips's introduction to the first publication of a newly discovered Shakespeare play about King Arthur. Th...moreWhen I reviewed Arthur Phillips's last novel The Song Is You, I faulted Phillips for filtering the central relationship (a love affair that never quite happens) through a series of moments that felt a little more sentimentalized than actually lived. In the new The Tragedy of Arthur Phillips takes a sharp left turn into the personal by way of metafiction. What we are reading is supposedly Phillips's introduction to the first publication of a newly discovered Shakespeare play about King Arthur. The "introduction" is over 250 pages long and reveals not one but two Arthurs, the author and his freewheeling con man of a father. The early chapters are a picaresque memoir that involves Arthur being an unwitting accomplice to some of his father's doings. It's the senior Phillips who brings the play to light and manages to overcome the suspicions of his son and Shakespeare-loving daughter as to its authenticity. The rest of the book is the full script of this "new", five-act Shakespearean play. It's Shakespeare who plays the role of father that Mr. Phillips cannot (due to his frequent prison sentences). Arthur has great fun with apologists who excuse the Bard's worst moments by claiming that Shakespeare was ahead of his time, but mirrors this behavior by repeatedly returning to put himself at the center of his father's shenanigans. Arthur's relationships with women, especially his sister's girlfriend, also flounder due to his lack of a good example. It's Arthur's sister Dana who escapes her father's curse, finding a way to celebrate Shakespeare (she becomes an actress) that doesn't involve a cycle of pulling away from and drawing back to her Dad.

The story of Arthur and Arthur eventually becomes a sort of thriller: Will young Arthur risk lawsuits and infamy (as well as forgo a big payday), break his contract with Random House, and not allow the play to be published? Since we know the play's true provenance the question is moot; it's whether Arthur can succeed as a man and a writer on his own that matters. Shakespeare can't be torn down but he also can't be piggybacked off of; that's the one thing Arthur's Dad fails to see. I wonder about including the entire script; while the play The Tragedy of Arthur (with dueling footnotes by Arthur and a Shakespearean scholar) is an entertaining enough read I found myself wanting to speed through it after the novel's conclusion. The play might have worked better as a sort of MacGuffin, constantly discussed but never fully seen. The complicated things that pass between father and son are well and imaginatively handled here, and I'll continue to return to Phillips's books to watch his next move. The Tragedy of Arthur is a literary game with not one but two beating hearts at its center. (also posted at Mostly Movies) (less)

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Apr 28, 2011

Felice rated it

There are a whole lot of Arthurs in The Tragedy of Arthur. There's the author, Arthur Phillips, the main character, Arthur, his father Arthur, King Arthur and a long lost Arthur. That last one is the second of the two tragedies of Arthur. In that list there's the lost Shakespearean play about King Arthur and the tragedies of all the other Arthurs who appear in the novel. Got it? Good because it's worth getting.

For the moment let's concentrate on the character Arthur. He was raised by...moreThere are a whole lot of Arthurs in The Tragedy of Arthur. There's the author, Arthur Phillips, the main character, Arthur, his father Arthur, King Arthur and a long lost Arthur. That last one is the second of the two tragedies of Arthur. In that list there's the lost Shakespearean play about King Arthur and the tragedies of all the other Arthurs who appear in the novel. Got it? Good because it's worth getting.

For the moment let's concentrate on the character Arthur. He was raised by a forger, conman father, Arthur. The kind of man who can make you believe anything he wants you to but as a father leaves everything to be desired. There were three constants in Arthur's life growing up: his love for his twin sister Dana, his family's' attraction to Shakespeare and the decades his father spent in prison. Both Arthur and Dana are influenced by Shakespeare as children. Dana becomes an actress and part time Shakespearean scholar and Arthur becomes a writer. Who knows maybe he becomes the other Arthur Phillips?

When Dad has finally done his time, his stretch, paid his dues and exits jail an old man he tells Arthur his great secret. A lifetime before he had stolen an original quarto from a British Estate. He claims that the quarto is a lost play by Shakespeare, "The Most Excellent and Tragical Historie of Arthur, King of Britain The Tragedy of Arthur". The play itself is a potboiler that follows the basic Arthurian legend. It's not great Shakespeare but does that matter if it's Shakespeare? Dad wants to get it authenticated and published--with his son's help. Could this be true or Dads' masterpiece con? The two Arthurs are finally able to come together, to bond over this play. Son Arthur even forgets for a moment that he's not Dad's favorite. For a moment.

It's a Father-Son novel! It's a memoir! It's a literary investigation! It's a play by Shakespeare! It's a lie, it's the truth. The Tragedy of Arthur is a cut from whole cloth creation about invention and forgery or maybe invention verses forgery. Phillips, the author, uses Shakespeare as his device to write about what artists invent, how we invent ourselves, how the media (in this case Phillip's publisher Random House) try to invent events, and what may be invention or forgery in all things Shakespeare.

The obvious comparisons to The Tragedy of Arthur are Nabokov's Pale Fire and A.S. Byatt's Possession. In both of those novels the author created works attributed to another writer and then built a novel around their discovery and critique. Phillips does all that and then takes that idea two steps further by bringing the unreliability of memoir and a populist sense of skepticism into the mix. His contrivances hit all the serious notes and still entertains.

The Tragedy of Arthur is exceptional skill on dexterous display. I have no doubt that for every reference the plot makes to one of Shakespeare's play that I caught there were fifty others that I missed but blame on my own educational laziness and not the author's wit and knowledge. Arthur Phillips uses humor, creativity and smarts in a way that dazzles in this novel. The Tragedy of Arthur is a completely accessible, virtuoso performance by a very talented, smart writer.

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Apr 24, 2011

James rated it

Shelves: fiction, humor

A comedy of Nabokovian proportions, the latest novel from Arthur Phillips is a fictional rendering of a long lost play purported to be by William Shakespeare. The play, however, is prefaced with a 256 page fictional memoir that tells the story of Arthur Phillips and his family and the trials and tribulations of his experience with Shakespearean tragedy. You know you are in for an interesting ride when the first line of the book is "I have never much liked Shakespeare." This is a narrat...more

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Oct 27, 2010

Ron rated it

Who knew that novelist Arthur Phillips had such an unconventional upbringing. His father was a forger who suspected young Arthur of turning him in. His father's legacy, though, was a folio edition of a lost, hitherto unknown, play by Shakespeare (the play, by the way, is a demythologized version of Arthur Pendragon's rise). Arthur’s (Phillips, that is) life is held together, more or less, by the anchoring force of his twin sister's love (Something Arthur also manages to put in jeopardy). Ess...more

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Jun 05, 2011

Rachelle Urist rated it

Loved it! It's manna from heaven - if you're a Shakespeare lover. I don't know how others would feel about it. Phillips mocks memoir writing while writing a memoir, though this memoir, about himself, is a complete fiction. He creates a family to parallel Shakespeare's. His father is a con-man who spends years in jail (Shakespeare's father, too, spent time in jail - for usury), and the author/protagonist has a twin sister (Shakespeare had twins, too: Hamnet & Judith). The father's a Shakesp...more

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Oct 28, 2011

Jay rated it

Maybe even a little more than four stars! I was hooked, absorbed, consumed when we finally reach what feels like present action, about 150 pages in; superb betrayal and tragedy. When Arthur meets his aged father in jail, the performance is astounding. All throughout, the underlying tension of whether this play (in the book's universe) was actually written by Shakespeare or not. Very good.

Not five stars because somewhat psychological, memoir-ist (which I'm not as interested in), also ...more

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Apr 08, 2011

Jill rated it

Shelves: best-of-2011

The very first thing I did after finishing The Tragedy of Author - Arthur Phillips's ingenious faux-memoir - was to Google to see what was true and what wasn't...only to find that much of Phillips's traceable past has been erased.

Did he really have a gay twin sister named Dana, a scam artist father who spent his adult life in prison, a Czech wife and twin sons of his own? Methinks not. What I do know is that Arthur Phillips shares his birthday with the Bard himself, that he was born in...moreThe very first thing I did after finishing The Tragedy of Author - Arthur Phillips's ingenious faux-memoir - was to Google to see what was true and what wasn't...only to find that much of Phillips's traceable past has been erased.

Did he really have a gay twin sister named Dana, a scam artist father who spent his adult life in prison, a Czech wife and twin sons of his own? Methinks not. What I do know is that Arthur Phillips shares his birthday with the Bard himself, that he was born in Minnesota, and that he is indeed a writer to be watched very carefully. Because what he's accomplished in this novel - er, memoir - is sheer genius.

Arthur Phillips - the character - is an unreliable narrator if there ever was one, and points it out in various excerpts. Right from the start when he says, "I have never much liked Shakespeare," we feel a little off-center. The book is, after all about the ultimate Shakespeare scam: his neer-do-well father, at the end of his life, shares with Arthur a previously unknown play by Shakespeare titled The Tragedy of Arthur and entices him to use his Random House connections to get the play published.

To say his connection with his father is complicated is an understatement. Arthur Phillips, memoirist, reflects, "His life was now beyond my comprehension and much of my sympathy - even if I had been a devoted visitor, a loving son, a concerned participant in his life. I was none of those." Now he wonders: did his father perform the ultimate con? If so, how did he pull it off? And how do the two Arthurs - Arthur the ancient king portrayed in the "lost" play and Arthur the memoirist - intertwine their fates?

It's a tricky project and Arthur Phillips - the novelist - is obviously having great fun with it. At one point, he urges readers to, "Go Google the van Meergeen Vermeers...Read James Frey's memoir now...We blink and look around, rubbing the fairy dust from our eyes, wonder whether we might have dreamt it all. Once you know it isn't Shakespeare, none of it sounds like Shakespeare. How could it." But somehow, it does.

The play is reproduced in its entirety in the second part and indeed, it reads like Shakespeare (I read all of his major plays in grad school and have seen many of them performed). It's absolutely brazen that Arthur Phillips could have mimicked Shakespeare so successfully and with seeming authenticity.

So in the end, the theme comes down to identity. As Phillips the memoirist writes, "So much of Shakespeare is about being at a loss for identity being lost somewhere without the self-defining security of home and security, lost in a shipwreck, confused with a long-lost twin, stripped of familiar power, taken for a thief, taken for the opposite gender, taken fora pauper, believeing oneself an orphan."

And, as Phillips the novelist knows, it's also a trick for perspective. The play, the novel, the memoir, the scam can equally be said to be "about a man born in Stratford in 1565 - maybe on April 22 or 24, by the way -- or about an apocryphal boy king in Dark Ages England or about my father or his idea of me or my grandfather or Dana in armor or or or." Just as Shakespeare may or may not have written his plays - according to some anti-Bards - so might this new one be a fakery, written by Arthur's fictional father. There is layer steeped upon layer steeped upon layer in this book. It's audacious and it's brilliant. Arthur Phillips convincingly shows us just how easy it is to reinvent a play, a history, or ourselves with just a few sweeps of a pen.(less)

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Jan 15, 2012

John rated it

Shelves: books-i-own, fiction

In his funniest novel to date, Arthur Phillips ("Prague", "The Egyptologist", "Angelica", "The Song Is You"), pokes fun at the genre of memoir and of Shakespearean scholarship in his irresistible "The Tragedy of Arthur", which allegedly one William Shakespeare wrote as a play that was left out of the 1597 Folio edition of his plays; those recognizable to anyone familiar with Shakespeare's oeuvre. Pulling no punches, Phillips casts himself as the ...moreIn his funniest novel to date, Arthur Phillips ("Prague", "The Egyptologist", "Angelica", "The Song Is You"), pokes fun at the genre of memoir and of Shakespearean scholarship in his irresistible "The Tragedy of Arthur", which allegedly one William Shakespeare wrote as a play that was left out of the 1597 Folio edition of his plays; those recognizable to anyone familiar with Shakespeare's oeuvre. Pulling no punches, Phillips casts himself as the befuddled famous literary son of his father, the artful dodger and the likely forger of this "Shakespeare" play. Having inherited the play's manuscript from his deceased father, Phillips finds himself the unlikely protagonist of this tale, authorized by Random House in editing and preparing for publication this long-lost "Shakespeare" play. And once he realizes that this manuscript is most likely an excellent forgery, he finds himself legally compelled by his Random House publisher Jennifer Hershey and her colleagues (both real and fictitious, including his Random House publicist whom I have met) to fulfill his contract by producing a publishable manuscript.

Much of "The Tragedy of Arthur" is an extensive Introduction that describes the complex relationships which Phillips has had with his father, his stepfather and with his twin sister Dana; an introduction that quite literally pokes fun at the genre of memoir itself (Anyone expecting the luminous lyrical prose of Frank McCourt's "Angela's Ashes", may be disappointed, since Phillips's Introduction isn't as memorably written, and yet, it is still a most fascinating work of memoir from another fine American author, the real Arthur Phillips himself.). Phillips has to contend with his sister's objections to his decision to withdraw this manuscript from publication, once he realizes that the play "The Tragedy of Arthur" was apparently forged by their father.

Those willing to wade through Phillips's memoir will be richly rewarded by the play itself, with introductory notes from a Professor Roland Verre. Readers shall find most hysterical, the literary back and forth, the slingshot duel of bon mots between Phillips and Verre, with Verre denouncing Phillips's claim that this "Shakespeare" play is simply a forgery cleverly conceived and executed by his father. All of these comments are listed as footnotes, with competing explanations for certain lines provided both by Verre and Phillips.

Taken as a whole, "The Tragedy of Arthur" is a most elegant comedy of errors conceived by Arthur Phillips. It's one of the funniest novels I have read in years, and definitely this year's best. Phillips has added yet another remarkable novel to his oeuvre, and one which confirms his place as among the finest American writers of my generation.

(Reposted from my 2011 Amazon review)(less)

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Sep 28, 2011

Jannekb rated it

Terrifically clever and moving novel framed as a long introduction to a newly found Shakespeare play. In twists upon twists of metafictional derring-do, the main character of the novel is Arthur Phillips, a Random House novelist, and the "real" author of "The Tradegy of Arthur" (or his fictional doppelganger). Because this is explicitly a novel, one wonders how much touches on actual autobiography and how much is fiction or experimentation, invention. That is the ongoing p...more

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Oct 24, 2011

Jodi rated it

Not even going to attempt a summary of this book. Arthur Philips has created an entertaining story-line about a lost copy of a William Shakespeare play (won’t say any more than that) of which I enjoyed about 95% of it (felt the ending of the “Introduction” was rushed after all the other meticulous writing). Did feel a bit like when my husband, an English teacher, and I went to see “Shakespeare in Love.” He was so well-versed in the plays of Shakespeare he was catching all sorts of things (huc...more

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Oct 23, 2011

Leah rated it

This book is an extremely meta fictional adventure in which the protagonist, named "Arthur Phillips" (not to be confused with the actual author of the book, which is kind of the point of the exercise) writes a preface to a "new Shakespeare play." As tale progresses, you realize that the "preface" is actually the novel itself, and though there's the "Shakespeare play" at the end, that's not the crux of the book.

The book itself plays a bit with re...more

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Feb 09, 2012

Victor Carson rated it

· review of another edition

I see that I am in the small minority of readers who dislikes this novel. I also admit that I did not read the play itself after suffering through the author's Introduction. The pace of the book is very slow, endlessly repetitive, and self-absorbed, like the fictional author who shares his name with the actual author of this book. The idea of writing a fictional memoir, using your own name and some real facts about your own life is bizarre, bordering on ridiculous. No publisher would have pu...more

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Sep 04, 2011

John Pappas rated it

Phillips' new novel, in which he himself is the protagonist, takes the form of a faux-introduction to a newly-discovered Shakespeare play, one that has either been stolen and hidden away or brilliantly forged by Phillips' con-man father. Complete with the entire text of the fake play, emails and legal letters to Random House, and other metafictional devices, Phillips creates a marvelous ruse in which the nature of a text's relationship to its author and audience is explored. What makes Shakespe...more

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Aug 05, 2011

Kristy rated it

A clever idea that is pulled off well -- Arthur Phillips has written a book about a character named "Arthur Phillips" whose father (Arthur Phillips, Sr.) is a professional forger and obsessive Shakespeare lover who spent much of Arthur's childhood in jail. On his deathbed, his father reveals that he found a 1597 printing of a lost Shakespeare play over 30 years ago and that he wants Arthur to have it published. The experts all agree that it's real, and while Arthur goes along with it a...more

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Jul 14, 2011

Dan rated it

I thought the concept here was pretty nifty. Ostensibly, this is a lost Shakespeare play, and while the play is included, the bulk of the novel is an "introduction" by the son of the man who found the play in an English country manor. Embroiled together is the tale of King Arthur (a, happily, unfamiliar Arthur from the one of legends) and the family history of the Phillips family. The son is a well-respected author, the sister is an at times anti-Stratfordian Shakespearean and the fath...more

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Feb 03, 2011

Marjorie Hakala rated it

So here is a novel in a shape I've never seen before:

1. A brief preface from Random House stating how excited they are to publish this brand new Shakespeare play, alluding to the role of the Phillips family in bringing the text to light, and suggesting that maybe we should go straight to the play and come back to Arthur Phillips' introduction later.

2. A 256-page "Introduction" about Arthur Phillips and his family and how his father came to leave him a quarto of ...moreSo here is a novel in a shape I've never seen before:

1. A brief preface from Random House stating how excited they are to publish this brand new Shakespeare play, alluding to the role of the Phillips family in bringing the text to light, and suggesting that maybe we should go straight to the play and come back to Arthur Phillips' introduction later.

2. A 256-page "Introduction" about Arthur Phillips and his family and how his father came to leave him a quarto of The Tragedy of Arthur by William Shakespeare. Phillips has begged his editors to cancel publication. The Introduction explains why he contracted to publish the book and then tried to back out, no longer believing the play was Shakespeare's.

I don't know anything about Arthur Phillips, so I don't know how much truth is in this introduction, except that he is apparently from Minnesota, as in the book, and the real titles of his other novels are sprinkled through the narrative. The story told here is very much a novel, at least in terms of genre--it's got a novel's treatment of themes and dialogue and scene. It's a story about a family, mostly. The father, Arthur Phillips senior, is a professional and frequently-jailed forger. He has two children, Arthur junior and his twin sister Dana. Dana and her father share a great love for Shakespeare. Arthur the novelist is less interested. He makes the case, throughout this introduction, that Shakespeare's status as the greatest writer of our language is essentially a historical accident, a result of the playwright's friends having been savvy enough to get together after his death and publish the First Folio. There were, he argues, other writers equally beloved. We think he's the greatest now because we've been told he's the greatest, and because, holding that belief, we read him more attentively and creatively than we read anybody else. By the time the story is done, Arthur is convinced that the play is not authentic, and pretty much the whole world--the whole actual world, including some scholars who are real outside the book--disagrees with him. They discuss the meter of the text and place it within Shakespeare's career. They pick up historical details that no contemporary forger, presumably, would come up with. (All of which is fascinating in this context, since every "proof" of the play's authenticity takes place within the book's fiction and so all those authentic lines and all their proofs have been made up. There's a kind of paradox here: it would prove the play's authorship if you discovered something in the text that only Shakespeare would do, but if you know what those things are, then they are known and thus can be forged. The only real proof would be if the play contained something nobody but Shakespeare knew, in which case nobody could recognize the proof.)

There's also a story to go with all this, to which I'm not doing justice here, but the result of all the discussion is that by the time I got to...

3. The full text of the play The Tragedy of Arthur

...I felt like I'd been out-thunk. I don't know if it was the intention, but the setup placed me in the situation of reading a "Shakespearean" play with the critical arguments played out but without the fog of history and mythology and criticism and past productions that surrounds a part of the canon. What remained was mostly the hard question: Is it good? Is it as good?

This is incredibly audacious--that Phillips has not just pulled off this act of literary ventriloquism and done all the criticism for us, but actively invited us to compare the quality of his writing with Shakespeare's. And guys? Parts of it are really good. There are lines that I find flat (too many repeated words to fit the meter, a monologue moving too tidily between its dramatic and its philosophical meaning). But parts of it are beautiful, in the manner of those passages in the plays that you don't understand right away but whose meter and imagery are immediately lovely. There are Hamlet-like monologues of self-doubt, and if they don't reach Hamlet's heights of poetry they go farther in other ways. Arthur, in this play, doesn't believe he's particularly fit to be king at all, and he undoes himself in curious and sympathetic ways. He's a remarkable creation.

There are footnotes from Phillips about lines that convince him his father wrote the play, and further notes from a scholar (this one fictional) who disagrees with him on numerous points, but by the time we get to the end of The Tragedy of Arthur, the explicit comparisons to the Phillips family history have receded into the background. There are no notes on the last page of the play, and nothing more after that. It's like we've been spun round and round for a game of blind man's bluff, and then we stop, and no one is there. And how was the play? It seems impossible to say. I have a feeling some reviewer will come along in April, when this book is released, and publish an opinion that's completely contrary to what I've said here, particularly about the play's quality. But reading it felt, in some ways, like reading a Shakespeare play; and it felt, in its newness, like reading a Shakespeare play never has the chance to feel.(less)

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“Who ever loved that loved not at first sight?" wrote Marlowe, the man Shakespeare feared for many years was the better writer, the man who with those words issued a license to misery to millions of underexperienced teenagers and thousands of overeducated middle-aged jackasses.” — 3 people liked it

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