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11th out of 289 books
—
368 voters
At Swim-Two-Birds
A wildly comic send-up of Irish literature and culture, At Swim-Two-Birds is the story of a young, lazy, and frequently drunk Irish college student who lives with his curmudgeonly uncle in Dublin. When not in bed (where he seems to spend most of his time) or reading he is composing a mischief-filled novel about Dermot Trellis, a second-rate author whose characters ultimate...more
Paperback, 240 pages
Published
August 17th 1998
by Dalkey Archive Press
(first published 1939)
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Jul 04, 2011
K.D. Oliveros
rated it
4 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommended to K.D. by:
Time 100, 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die (2006-2010)
At Swim-To-Birds is a 1939 novel by Irish author Brian O’Nolan under the non de plueme Flann O’Brien. At one time, he also used a pen name Myles na Coppaleen (Myles of the Little Horses) taken from the character in Dion Boucicault’s play The Colleen Bawn. When my brother and I learned about this other pseudonym we thought that O’Brien might have some naughty Filipino friends or relatives. Myles could be a name of an Irish person, male or female. Then na Coppaleen is, in Filipino language, a desc...more
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Here is how this goes. On an intellectual level, at Swim two Birds is nonpareil. Its like watching an expert surgeon performing keyhole surgery par excellence: not a wrong move, each clinical motion precisely fitted and flowing effortlessly into the next: a symphony of elegantly executed literary manoeuvres which coalesce discrete etudes into a continuo of cohesiveness: no faults. Not a one. Innovative, large, yet humble, sprawling, yet mindful of an epicentre, gargantuan ambition anchored in re...more
16 likes · like · see review
Did not think that anything more zany than the 'Third Policeman' was possible (people who like 'Lost' should check the book out, by the way)... On my first read of this book (in 2009) I was too entranced with the main plot device of the characters plotting against the author etc and probably overlooked the insane ironies, the scathing parodies and the Joycean aspects. Now I know why this is a classic. A must read for Borges and Calvino fans. Tristram Shandy, here I come.
Caveat: Store up oodles o...more
Caveat: Store up oodles o...more
20 likes · like · see review
![[P]](http://d.gr-assets.com/users/1368277303p2/3355797.jpg)
A SHORT REVIEW WITHOUT ANY PERSONAL ANECDOTES or REMINISCENCES [...AND THEY SAID IT COULDN'T BE DONE!]
Do you know the saying ‘they don’t make them like that anymore?’ It seems each successive generation thinks the previous one, their own, greater than the current. In their day things were different; things were bigger, better, of finer quality.
Well, I wasn’t even born [and nor, in fact, were my parents] when this novel was written, so I say with no misguided nostalgia that they don’t write 'em...more
Do you know the saying ‘they don’t make them like that anymore?’ It seems each successive generation thinks the previous one, their own, greater than the current. In their day things were different; things were bigger, better, of finer quality.
Well, I wasn’t even born [and nor, in fact, were my parents] when this novel was written, so I say with no misguided nostalgia that they don’t write 'em...more
18 likes · like · see review
This is a testament to why I love goodreads: I don't think I ever would have stumbled across this singularly unique gem without it.
The book almost defies review because it defies all literary conventions; however, it does so in such an overt and parodic manner that it never becomes tedious reading. I suppose it's like the ying to Beckett's yang--both completely discount plot, but one is lighthearted and comical while the other is laborious and depressing.
The absurdity of the book is always righ...more
The book almost defies review because it defies all literary conventions; however, it does so in such an overt and parodic manner that it never becomes tedious reading. I suppose it's like the ying to Beckett's yang--both completely discount plot, but one is lighthearted and comical while the other is laborious and depressing.
The absurdity of the book is always righ...more
14 likes · like · see review
The unnamed narrator, a dissolute university student badly neglecting his studies, explains to his friends-in-drink, with countless diversions, the novel he is writing about Mr. Delmot Trellis, a slothful and dissolute inhabitant of an inn, who in turn is writing a novel about a character, inter alia, who is born middle-aged. Our primary narrator describes, among other information, his theory of writing novels, including his conviction that characters need not be developed de novo but should be...more
Oct 09, 2007
Spiros
added it
Recommends it for:
Those who like this sort of thing
Shelves:
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Ok, it's official: I got to page 127, and I GIVE UP.
There were parts at the beginning of this book which I quite enjoyed. Unfortunately, after slogging through the last 80 or so pages of random witterings, I can't remember what they were or why I enjoyed them. A few casual impressions that I was left with:
1. "What do you read, my lord?
Words, words, words."
-HAMLET, Act II, scene 2
2. I am reasonably certain that, had I read this book in high school, I would have eaten it up; I would have rea...more
There were parts at the beginning of this book which I quite enjoyed. Unfortunately, after slogging through the last 80 or so pages of random witterings, I can't remember what they were or why I enjoyed them. A few casual impressions that I was left with:
1. "What do you read, my lord?
Words, words, words."
-HAMLET, Act II, scene 2
2. I am reasonably certain that, had I read this book in high school, I would have eaten it up; I would have rea...more
15 likes · like · see review
A Review Composed of Interrogatives and Speculations
What are we to make of At Swim-Two-Birds? Despite the fact of its being one of the laugh-out-loud funniest, most absurdly and grossly comedic, most intelligent novels I’ve ever read, At Swim-Two-Birds is simultaneously profoundly cruel, cruelly profound, unsettling, and causes such a discord with the idea of imaginative reality and authority in fiction that I would say that the overall effect of reading the book is something akin to a blend of...more
What are we to make of At Swim-Two-Birds? Despite the fact of its being one of the laugh-out-loud funniest, most absurdly and grossly comedic, most intelligent novels I’ve ever read, At Swim-Two-Birds is simultaneously profoundly cruel, cruelly profound, unsettling, and causes such a discord with the idea of imaginative reality and authority in fiction that I would say that the overall effect of reading the book is something akin to a blend of...more
19 likes · like · see review
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4 likes · like · see review
"Shanahan at this point inserted a brown tobacco finger in the texture of the story and in this manner caused a lacuna in the palimpsest"
This is how the narrator describes Shanahan's interruption of the story being written by Orlick Trellis (son of the author/protagonist) of a story in which all of them are characters, at the point where Orlick introduces Shanahan, yet again, as a character of the story he is now writing (yes, that's how convoluted it gets).
There can hardly be a better term than...more
This is how the narrator describes Shanahan's interruption of the story being written by Orlick Trellis (son of the author/protagonist) of a story in which all of them are characters, at the point where Orlick introduces Shanahan, yet again, as a character of the story he is now writing (yes, that's how convoluted it gets).
There can hardly be a better term than...more
3 likes · like · see review
Cannot wait to start this one. Highly recommended, a couple of fun little bookstore investigations, just chomping at the bit. This book is going to be amazing. I can tell already.
***
and it WAS great. I had it on a four star basis throughout most of the reading, due to the metafictional thing leaving me just the slightest bit dry and confused, just can't abide being TOO alienated from the story. But the last 20 pages brought me back and achieved an unexpected tenderness and a lyrical glow (availa...more
***
and it WAS great. I had it on a four star basis throughout most of the reading, due to the metafictional thing leaving me just the slightest bit dry and confused, just can't abide being TOO alienated from the story. But the last 20 pages brought me back and achieved an unexpected tenderness and a lyrical glow (availa...more
Flann O'Brien is surely Ireland's most neglected writer. Though his talent was on a par with the genius of his contemporaries, Joyce and Beckett, he has never come close to achieving the same degree of recognition. There are several possible explanations for this. The simplest is that Joyce and Beckett managed to cut the umbilical cord - though Mother Ireland featured large in their writing, they both managed to make an escape, living the latter part of their lives in exile. This might not seem...more
23 likes · like · see review
Comedia, sátira, surrealismo, metaliteratura, mitología irlandesa, demonios, duendes, beodos, metafísica, fábulas, historias de historias de historias, y mucha cerveza, de todo esto nos habla Flann O’Brien en la que fue su primera novela, ‘En Nadar-dos-pájaros’ (At Swim-Two-Birds, 1939).
La novela se inicia con un joven estudiante, bastante haragán, al que su tío no deja de incordiar para que abra algún libro de vez en cuando, y que dedica su tiempo de ocio para escribir una novela. Esta novela t...more
La novela se inicia con un joven estudiante, bastante haragán, al que su tío no deja de incordiar para que abra algún libro de vez en cuando, y que dedica su tiempo de ocio para escribir una novela. Esta novela t...more
1 like · like · see review
Mar 20, 2012
Bastet
rated it
5 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
mis-favoritos,
guinness
Flann O'Brien ha sido un descubrimiento tardío pero muy provechoso. En Nadar-dos-pájaros está considerada la obra maestra de este escritor irlandés contemporáneo de James Joyce, quien dijo de esta novela: "He aquí un auténtico escritor con auténtico espíritu cómico. Un libro realmente divertido". Pese a que el editor estaba entusiasmado con esta obra, que comparó con el Tristram Shandy de Sterne y el Ulises de Joyce, tuvo mala suerte. El propio O'Brien lo explicaba con estas palabras: "En el año...more
This one is hard to write about, because it's so silly and strange and probably not for everyone, but I love it. It's like my review has to do the book justice or I will fail in my own opinions, or something.
I'm glad it's finally available on Kindle, because, being a library book, I didn't remember most of it the second time I read it.
I guess the style is sort of similar to "A Confederacy of Dunces," which I am a sucker for. That flowery, overly serious nonsense is already funny to begin with, b...more
I'm glad it's finally available on Kindle, because, being a library book, I didn't remember most of it the second time I read it.
I guess the style is sort of similar to "A Confederacy of Dunces," which I am a sucker for. That flowery, overly serious nonsense is already funny to begin with, b...more
Das ist "genau das richtige Buch für Deine Schwester, falls sie laut, schmutzig und versoffen ist" sagte Dylan Thomas über "At Swim-Two-Birds" ("Auf Schwimmen-zwei-Vögel").
Ein Dubliner Studenten schreibt einen Roman über Trellis, der seit zwanzig Jahren im Bett liegt, nur grüne Bücher liest und einen Roman schreibt. Die Romanfiguren werden dem ihnen aufgezwungenen Leben überdrüssig und schreiben einen Roman über Trellis, in dem sie sich rächen, "ihn mit einem Plusquamperfekt durchbohren". Nun di...more
Ein Dubliner Studenten schreibt einen Roman über Trellis, der seit zwanzig Jahren im Bett liegt, nur grüne Bücher liest und einen Roman schreibt. Die Romanfiguren werden dem ihnen aufgezwungenen Leben überdrüssig und schreiben einen Roman über Trellis, in dem sie sich rächen, "ihn mit einem Plusquamperfekt durchbohren". Nun di...more
Okay, I was supposed to read this mother in grad school, but I was too busy: drinking or playing basketball or eating lunch with Chad or working out or trying to sleep with one of my classmates/students/neighbors or the vaguely French-looking chick at Al's that played rad songs on the jukebox. In any case I didn't read much of it then because, well, it is a difficult book for all-time fuckups to read. Here's the deal, I read it today. All of it. In one day. Why? Because it is fucking hilarious a...more
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23 likes · like · see review
I didn't finish this book--which is very rare for me--because I just didn't like it that much. I got about halfway through, which I felt like a real achievement considering how slow-going it is. I've read some slow books in my day but usually there's a substitute for a practically plotless novel: humor, stylistic beauty, philosophic depth, etc. Although some think this is a hilarious book, I didn't find even a tenth as entertaining as "The Third Policeman." And even though O'Brien is a terrific...more
On Saint Paddy’s Day there was an article about Flann O’Brien. It reminded me that I had to re-try this most crazy of Irish writers. I had read The Third Policeman and laughed a lot but didn’t really get it. (Now there’s a police story to twist your brain.) So I was wary opening At Swim-Two-Birds. It is not as difficult - though it is certainly a wild and strange and beautiful ride.
This is what I would call absurdist Irish comedy from the first half of the 20th Century. At base, this novel is a...more
I have resolved to write something about every book I read this year. It may end up being a plot synopsis, or a sestina, or simply the words "I done read a berk!" I'm making no promises of coherence or insight.
Anyway, the first book I read in 2013 was Flann O'Brien's comic extravaganza, At Swim-Two Birds. The narrator is a slightly pompous university student who spends his days avoiding his dour uncle and composing a novel, of sorts, about an author named John Trellis who forces his characters -...more
Anyway, the first book I read in 2013 was Flann O'Brien's comic extravaganza, At Swim-Two Birds. The narrator is a slightly pompous university student who spends his days avoiding his dour uncle and composing a novel, of sorts, about an author named John Trellis who forces his characters -...more
Willfully brilliant, willfully frustrating and willfully flawed. Also, it is very funny (in places); it's downright tedious in others. My first pass at O'Brien, I wanted to read this before embarking on the better known Third Policeman. At first I was pretty confounded: I was reading at night, in bed with a glass of wine, listening to jazz and not paying a whole lot of attention. This is not how to read the book. It skips to its own rhythm, it plays its own games and it demands your entire atten...more
Because it’s confusing, I'll mention that Swim-Two-Birds is a place name, a place where a character stops briefly on a couple of occasions.
When it was published in 1939, this book got a lot of play for being what is now called a meta-novel. That is, much of the action occurs among characters who are executing a conspiracy against their author, who is himself a character in a novel written by the 'author' (Flann O'Brien) or the persona of O’Brien, who, confusingly, writes under several other nam...more
When it was published in 1939, this book got a lot of play for being what is now called a meta-novel. That is, much of the action occurs among characters who are executing a conspiracy against their author, who is himself a character in a novel written by the 'author' (Flann O'Brien) or the persona of O’Brien, who, confusingly, writes under several other nam...more
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Dylan Thomas said "This is just the book to give to your sister if she's a loud, dirty, boozy girl!" which is funny, because I have been all three of those (though rarely at once), and I couldn't decide which of my brothers to give this to first! It brilliantly parodies Irish literature both high and low. It will indeed remind you of Tristram Shandy and Joyce and I find it their equal, though perhaps I preferred the Third Policeman. But some of the sentences will make any writer swoon (more than...more
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I'm glad I can write a review of this without giving it a rating, that's for sure. The last thing I need is to be assaulted by legions of self-consciously intellectual and/or hip readers decrying my inability to 'get it,' because I gave a crappy rating to a probably interesting book. Instead I can write a review which such readers won't bother reading and perhaps save you the effort of picking the book up, or, alternatively, help you discover that this is a book of the type that you enjoy.
But s...more
But s...more
3 likes · like · see review
Wow! What a find! We've heard of James Joyce but not this fellow, and I submit to you that there is no good reason for that other than a twist of history. Namely, O'Brien did not leave Ireland, sticking around to slog it out in a cultural vacuum while his contemporaries mucked about England and mainland Europe getting famous and selling tomes.
This book surely changed fiction as we know it; he uses devices that are so fresh they are still fresh today, wonderfully weird and strangely satisfying. T...more
This book surely changed fiction as we know it; he uses devices that are so fresh they are still fresh today, wonderfully weird and strangely satisfying. T...more
First of all; beautifully written. Gass points out in his foreword that it's not merely parody because it 'excels the original'. Whether or not it excels is besides the point; it's delicious writing.
The first Fifty pages or so didn't grab me, but once Furriskey was born proper the book kind of just slayed me to the end. Really grand.
I was confused while reading it as to whether or not Flann O'Brien had a point or not; whether he had some big...'thing'...behind him (like, of course, Joyce & B...more
The first Fifty pages or so didn't grab me, but once Furriskey was born proper the book kind of just slayed me to the end. Really grand.
I was confused while reading it as to whether or not Flann O'Brien had a point or not; whether he had some big...'thing'...behind him (like, of course, Joyce & B...more
May 08, 2009
Libby
rated it
5 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
people who can handle metafiction and have a fondness for stout
If I was to be stranded on a desert island for the rest of my life and could only take one book with me this would be it. It is so complex and rich that every new reading reveals details previously missed and perspectives not previously considered. The Pooka MacPhellimey and the Good Fairy are just genius.
"Afterwards, near Lad Lañe Pólice Station a small man in black fell in with us and tapping me often about the chest, talked to me earnestly on the subject of Rousseau, a member of the French n...more
"Afterwards, near Lad Lañe Pólice Station a small man in black fell in with us and tapping me often about the chest, talked to me earnestly on the subject of Rousseau, a member of the French n...more
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At Swim - Two Birds = Are Reading - Three Novels
That's exactly what the novel is, three in one.
A student of literature, the character who remains un- named, believes that one beginning and one end, is "boring ".
Before reading this, I got lost in reading it. I wondered if the file I downloaded was corrupt and I was missing parts, or if it was the wrong book all together.. until thanks to Wikipedia; It made some sense. Until then, I'll admit.. I thought I overdosed on Tylenol.
I don't like the bo...more
That's exactly what the novel is, three in one.
A student of literature, the character who remains un- named, believes that one beginning and one end, is "boring ".
Before reading this, I got lost in reading it. I wondered if the file I downloaded was corrupt and I was missing parts, or if it was the wrong book all together.. until thanks to Wikipedia; It made some sense. Until then, I'll admit.. I thought I overdosed on Tylenol.
I don't like the bo...more
It’s appropriate that the name on the cover of At Swim-Two-Birds isn’t Brian O’Nolan, the Irish writer born 5 October, 1911, deceased 1 April, 1966. O’Nolan used pennames for nearly everything he wrote, including periodicals in the Irish Times as Myles na gCopaleen and novels as Flann O’Brien. Thus, before you even open the cover of At Swim-Two-Birds, a/Authority is called into question. And man, it only gets zanier.
@S2B is about an unnamed university student in Dublin writing a book about an au...more
@S2B is about an unnamed university student in Dublin writing a book about an au...more
| topics | posts | views | last activity | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Goodreads Librari...: Secondary author with two roles | 3 | 44 | Sep 10, 2012 02:43pm | |
| Goodreads Librari...: ISBN13: 9780452259133 | 2 | 151 | Jul 13, 2012 05:33pm |
Pseudonym of Brian Ó Nualláin, also known as Brian O'Nolan.
His English novels appeared under the name of Flann O’Brien, while his great Irish novel and his newspaper column (which appeared from 1940 to 1966) were signed Myles na gCopaleen or Myles na Gopaleen – the second being a phonetic rendering of the first. One of twelve brothers and sisters, he was born in 1911 in Strabane, County Tyrone, in...more
More about Flann O'Brien...
His English novels appeared under the name of Flann O’Brien, while his great Irish novel and his newspaper column (which appeared from 1940 to 1966) were signed Myles na gCopaleen or Myles na Gopaleen – the second being a phonetic rendering of the first. One of twelve brothers and sisters, he was born in 1911 in Strabane, County Tyrone, in...more
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“I saw that my witticism was unperceived and quietly replaced it in the treasury of my mind.”
—
40 people liked it
“When a man sleeps, he is steeped and lost in a limp toneless happiness: awake he is restless, tortured by his body and the illusion of existence. Why have men spent the centuries seeking to overcome the awakened body? Put it to sleep, that is a better way. Let it serve only to turn the sleeping soul over, to change the blood-stream and thus make possible a deeper and more refined sleep.”
—
17 people liked it
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