What do you think?
Rate this book
The Book of Dave
What if a demented London cabbie called Dave Rudman wrote a book to his estranged son to give him some fatherly advice?
What if that book was buried in Hampstead and hundreds of years later, when rising sea levels have put London underwater, spawned a religion?
What if one man decided to question life according to Dave? And what if Dave had indeed made a mistake?
What if that book was buried in Hampstead and hundreds of years later, when rising sea levels have put London underwater, spawned a religion?
What if one man decided to question life according to Dave? And what if Dave had indeed made a mistake?
496 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2006
207 people are currently reading
4038 people want to read
About the author
Will Self
176 books1,016 followersWilliam Self is an English novelist, reviewer and columnist. He received his education at University College School, Christ's College Finchley, and Exeter College, Oxford. He was married to the late journalist Deborah Orr.
Self is known for his satirical, grotesque and fantastic novels and short stories set in seemingly parallel universes.
Self is known for his satirical, grotesque and fantastic novels and short stories set in seemingly parallel universes.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 400 reviews
August 19, 2010
Note: This review was written on Aug 19th 2007 when the writer was a doe-eyed yoof of twenty.
Were2guv? The Island of Ham?
The latest doorstopper from the Prometheus of contemporary storytelling Will Self is a work of catatonic, lucid and breathtaking speculative fiction, alternating between a post-apocalyptic world governed by gibbering Cockernees and a present post-9/11 London, blighted by gibbering Cockernees.
The Book of Dave is built upon the idea of what might happen were a bigoted, repulsive London cabbie to write a book of his opinions addressed to his estranged son, and for that book to form the basis of a new world order after rising sea levels have consumed the planet. The future world, or London at least, is governed from this book—the last remaining edict of civilisation. The novel establishes a clever and intricate parallel between the nightmarish future world of barbarous swamp-life and primitive tribalism, and the current life of Dave Rudman, a hateful racist and misogynist tumbling towards his own self-destruction.
Plot & Intrigue
The narrative which opens the novel, set in 523 AD (After Dave, presumably) is perhaps the most fascinating of the two and Self has invented an entirely concurrent mythology which borrows from the current day scheme of things to create both its humour and intrigue. He has also invented his own form of warped linguistics for his primitive characters to communicate in, which is used just for the parts of direct speech and lightly punctuates the narrative. The protagonists talk in a distorted form of text-speak, and words are spelled out phonetically in the thick London accent they have retained, regressing to an almost incomprehensible tide of gibberish at times. The capital of London itself has split into an archipelago, and the narrative becomes a bewildering adventure and religious pilgrimage not unlike a certain Gormenghast trilogy, and the complex nature of their quest makes the mythology and its lingo an integral part of its understanding.
The second narrative is more straightforward, at least on an aesthetic level, and is dominated by the aforementioned Dave, and Self selects episodes from his life to chronicle his inexorable spiral downwards into complete mental collapse. In the first section, large paragraphs of italicised prose give insight into his mind, which is often just an outpouring of bile and racism, and we later learn of how he met his wife, ended up with a child and how he turned out to be such a despairing no-hoper with an incredible axe to grind with the world. The names of protagonists in both narratives are interchanged to link antecedents with descendents and so on, and the art of cab driving is the strongest metaphor which is spooled back into the fantasy world.
As someone with a terrible mind for storing plot detail, this book places no onus upon the reader to keep on top of the terminology since much of it is a mere bonus and indulgence. It is actually the strongest comedic device used in the book, and underlines the awfulness of a new world order being a derivative universe dictated by the most unappealing and inappropriate trappings of commercial, New Labour Britain. The plot is therefore accessible with each chapter, provided the reader is willing to follow the flights of spontaneous imagination Self builds his world upon brick-by-brick. As an example, burgerkine is a word used to describe cattle and cloakyfing is used to indicate a Muslim burka. There is a point to this. I’ll come to it in a moment.
Theme & Style
Just from the dizzying feat of descriptive ingenuity that gushes forth from the first paragraph alone, it is clear that Will Self is one Leviathan talent, and one of the most innovative writers at large in the world just now. The Book of Dave manages to meld adventure, fantasy, social concern, religious and political intrigue, surreal and ingenious satire and a staggering character portrait into a seamless tome that ascends into its own untouchable pantheon of artistic genius. The prose in all Self texts is an unflinching tapestry of experimental wordplay, erudite phraseology and relentless poetic wonderment, woven with a stoical third-person narrative voice which is unafraid to diffuse the loftiness of his intention with a sprinkling of earthbound humour.
The influences of Self are often simple to pinpoint, be it the preoccupation with dehumanised male protagonists, channelled through intricate allegorical conduit such as the work of Franz Kafka, the obsession with pushing the boundaries of language and the academic’s desire to experiment with conventions a la Martin Amis or even the introverted gloominess and postmodern mind-scrambling of lit-fixated Ubermenschen such as Alasdair Gray. Here, Self manages to do this while tipping his hat to the great tradition of darker southern gothic writers such as Mervyn Peake, and Anglicising the humour of sci-fi genius Kurt Vonnegut. This album has components of all those authors, but then again, a person can read hundreds of authors influence into a text if he looks hard enough. These are some of the obvious points of comparison for those in the dark about Self.
While the fantasy element of the book is captivating, Self has structured the novel so that each chapter is approximately 30 pages in length, meaning the reader is forced to immerse his or herself in his world. Which is no chore given the quality of his writing. The book itself is his largest to date, and took me about two weeks to complete, giving me sufficient time to contemplate the message he wished to convey at some length. As did this review, in fact. Often Self, as a moralist, can come across as too lecturing at times, although this book has been designed as a weary portent of what might happen to the world should people continue to behave as they do at present, subtitled a Revelation of Recent Past and Distant Future.
With this in mind, The Book of Dave I believe has two main intentions. The first is, through its preoccupation with fractured families and feuding tribes, to remind people that through our intolerant, dissatisfied culture where everything is immediate and people are comparatively greedier and more self-obsessed, children are being given the wrong message with regards to both the sanctity of marriage and human relationships in general. There has been a marked decline in the sophistication of children and the attitudes of young people towards religious beliefs and minority groups at large, and the one causation for this—as with most things—is a ruptured family unit. Although it might sound like a somewhat trite aim, Self does want to remind people how important it is to respect almost every living organism we are faced with, since we might just regress back to being savages after a nuclear holocaust and end up the lowest form of being. All organisms with the exception perhaps of the motos, a repulsive creature used for oil and food.
It is possible to scour this book for its metaphors, but this would take me a lengthier period of time and I need to sum it up in a pithier manner than this. Aside from the notion of family, this novel is a prescient religious allegory, especially in recent times when people have yet to learn from history. The primitive brutality of the primeval civilisation holds a clear mirror to the situation in Iraq (hinted in the second chapter) and that the causation of war and strife is all predicated upon documents as unverifiable as the next. The Book of Dave represents all religious texts: no-one knows where they came from, but one day they were found and people started to follow them. The anger and frustration in this text is palpable, a sentiment most readers will pick up on. Religion is not dismissed in this book, since Dave refuses it too help redeem himself when he needs it most, but instead it is approached with a incisive eye and gigantic brain.
Flaws?
Self has written with an often ironic or misanthropic detachment in the past, which makes his moments of genuine redemption or visceral emotion harder to pick up on. Although these moments are here, albeit tangled in a net of irreverent humour or fanciful poetic phrasing, the vivid prose of the future is too accurate to overlook and a person just might throw up were he to recognise a crumb of himself in Dave Rudman. The fact is, there is a little of Dave in all of us, since he represents the worst of our excesses and the most intolerant of our personalities. As painful as the truth might seem, most of us are in our own little way just as responsible for social exclusion, religious discrimination or moral indifference.
Some might complain about the gumption Will Self has to take on the dialect and least privileged area of the working classes, when he himself is a bourgeois suburbanite through and through. We can only assume since he is himself a Londoner, he has a fine knowledge of both the patois of cabbies, and in his research performed some undercover work in refining the nuances of the dialect and the sorts of opinions he heard that helped form the character of Dave. However, the nature of Self’s writing makes it almost inaccessible to those who perhaps do little reading, or those who are involved in cab driving with a poorer education. This novel might end up at the hands of the discerning middle classes again, which somehow feels a little dissatisfying.
The Book of Dave might not put a spring in one’s step – it is an uncompromising and bleak book – but it should shake a person from their lethargy with the aim to a little self-improvement here and there. It is also (it needs reminding) a staggering work of literary genius, combining a Swiftian satire with a vertiginous trek through the boggy swamps of Kafkaesque dislocation. Perhaps the finest novel about the “state of things” in Britain this millennium.
Were2guv? The Island of Ham?
The latest doorstopper from the Prometheus of contemporary storytelling Will Self is a work of catatonic, lucid and breathtaking speculative fiction, alternating between a post-apocalyptic world governed by gibbering Cockernees and a present post-9/11 London, blighted by gibbering Cockernees.
The Book of Dave is built upon the idea of what might happen were a bigoted, repulsive London cabbie to write a book of his opinions addressed to his estranged son, and for that book to form the basis of a new world order after rising sea levels have consumed the planet. The future world, or London at least, is governed from this book—the last remaining edict of civilisation. The novel establishes a clever and intricate parallel between the nightmarish future world of barbarous swamp-life and primitive tribalism, and the current life of Dave Rudman, a hateful racist and misogynist tumbling towards his own self-destruction.
Plot & Intrigue
The narrative which opens the novel, set in 523 AD (After Dave, presumably) is perhaps the most fascinating of the two and Self has invented an entirely concurrent mythology which borrows from the current day scheme of things to create both its humour and intrigue. He has also invented his own form of warped linguistics for his primitive characters to communicate in, which is used just for the parts of direct speech and lightly punctuates the narrative. The protagonists talk in a distorted form of text-speak, and words are spelled out phonetically in the thick London accent they have retained, regressing to an almost incomprehensible tide of gibberish at times. The capital of London itself has split into an archipelago, and the narrative becomes a bewildering adventure and religious pilgrimage not unlike a certain Gormenghast trilogy, and the complex nature of their quest makes the mythology and its lingo an integral part of its understanding.
The second narrative is more straightforward, at least on an aesthetic level, and is dominated by the aforementioned Dave, and Self selects episodes from his life to chronicle his inexorable spiral downwards into complete mental collapse. In the first section, large paragraphs of italicised prose give insight into his mind, which is often just an outpouring of bile and racism, and we later learn of how he met his wife, ended up with a child and how he turned out to be such a despairing no-hoper with an incredible axe to grind with the world. The names of protagonists in both narratives are interchanged to link antecedents with descendents and so on, and the art of cab driving is the strongest metaphor which is spooled back into the fantasy world.
As someone with a terrible mind for storing plot detail, this book places no onus upon the reader to keep on top of the terminology since much of it is a mere bonus and indulgence. It is actually the strongest comedic device used in the book, and underlines the awfulness of a new world order being a derivative universe dictated by the most unappealing and inappropriate trappings of commercial, New Labour Britain. The plot is therefore accessible with each chapter, provided the reader is willing to follow the flights of spontaneous imagination Self builds his world upon brick-by-brick. As an example, burgerkine is a word used to describe cattle and cloakyfing is used to indicate a Muslim burka. There is a point to this. I’ll come to it in a moment.
Theme & Style
Just from the dizzying feat of descriptive ingenuity that gushes forth from the first paragraph alone, it is clear that Will Self is one Leviathan talent, and one of the most innovative writers at large in the world just now. The Book of Dave manages to meld adventure, fantasy, social concern, religious and political intrigue, surreal and ingenious satire and a staggering character portrait into a seamless tome that ascends into its own untouchable pantheon of artistic genius. The prose in all Self texts is an unflinching tapestry of experimental wordplay, erudite phraseology and relentless poetic wonderment, woven with a stoical third-person narrative voice which is unafraid to diffuse the loftiness of his intention with a sprinkling of earthbound humour.
The influences of Self are often simple to pinpoint, be it the preoccupation with dehumanised male protagonists, channelled through intricate allegorical conduit such as the work of Franz Kafka, the obsession with pushing the boundaries of language and the academic’s desire to experiment with conventions a la Martin Amis or even the introverted gloominess and postmodern mind-scrambling of lit-fixated Ubermenschen such as Alasdair Gray. Here, Self manages to do this while tipping his hat to the great tradition of darker southern gothic writers such as Mervyn Peake, and Anglicising the humour of sci-fi genius Kurt Vonnegut. This album has components of all those authors, but then again, a person can read hundreds of authors influence into a text if he looks hard enough. These are some of the obvious points of comparison for those in the dark about Self.
While the fantasy element of the book is captivating, Self has structured the novel so that each chapter is approximately 30 pages in length, meaning the reader is forced to immerse his or herself in his world. Which is no chore given the quality of his writing. The book itself is his largest to date, and took me about two weeks to complete, giving me sufficient time to contemplate the message he wished to convey at some length. As did this review, in fact. Often Self, as a moralist, can come across as too lecturing at times, although this book has been designed as a weary portent of what might happen to the world should people continue to behave as they do at present, subtitled a Revelation of Recent Past and Distant Future.
With this in mind, The Book of Dave I believe has two main intentions. The first is, through its preoccupation with fractured families and feuding tribes, to remind people that through our intolerant, dissatisfied culture where everything is immediate and people are comparatively greedier and more self-obsessed, children are being given the wrong message with regards to both the sanctity of marriage and human relationships in general. There has been a marked decline in the sophistication of children and the attitudes of young people towards religious beliefs and minority groups at large, and the one causation for this—as with most things—is a ruptured family unit. Although it might sound like a somewhat trite aim, Self does want to remind people how important it is to respect almost every living organism we are faced with, since we might just regress back to being savages after a nuclear holocaust and end up the lowest form of being. All organisms with the exception perhaps of the motos, a repulsive creature used for oil and food.
It is possible to scour this book for its metaphors, but this would take me a lengthier period of time and I need to sum it up in a pithier manner than this. Aside from the notion of family, this novel is a prescient religious allegory, especially in recent times when people have yet to learn from history. The primitive brutality of the primeval civilisation holds a clear mirror to the situation in Iraq (hinted in the second chapter) and that the causation of war and strife is all predicated upon documents as unverifiable as the next. The Book of Dave represents all religious texts: no-one knows where they came from, but one day they were found and people started to follow them. The anger and frustration in this text is palpable, a sentiment most readers will pick up on. Religion is not dismissed in this book, since Dave refuses it too help redeem himself when he needs it most, but instead it is approached with a incisive eye and gigantic brain.
Flaws?
Self has written with an often ironic or misanthropic detachment in the past, which makes his moments of genuine redemption or visceral emotion harder to pick up on. Although these moments are here, albeit tangled in a net of irreverent humour or fanciful poetic phrasing, the vivid prose of the future is too accurate to overlook and a person just might throw up were he to recognise a crumb of himself in Dave Rudman. The fact is, there is a little of Dave in all of us, since he represents the worst of our excesses and the most intolerant of our personalities. As painful as the truth might seem, most of us are in our own little way just as responsible for social exclusion, religious discrimination or moral indifference.
Some might complain about the gumption Will Self has to take on the dialect and least privileged area of the working classes, when he himself is a bourgeois suburbanite through and through. We can only assume since he is himself a Londoner, he has a fine knowledge of both the patois of cabbies, and in his research performed some undercover work in refining the nuances of the dialect and the sorts of opinions he heard that helped form the character of Dave. However, the nature of Self’s writing makes it almost inaccessible to those who perhaps do little reading, or those who are involved in cab driving with a poorer education. This novel might end up at the hands of the discerning middle classes again, which somehow feels a little dissatisfying.
The Book of Dave might not put a spring in one’s step – it is an uncompromising and bleak book – but it should shake a person from their lethargy with the aim to a little self-improvement here and there. It is also (it needs reminding) a staggering work of literary genius, combining a Swiftian satire with a vertiginous trek through the boggy swamps of Kafkaesque dislocation. Perhaps the finest novel about the “state of things” in Britain this millennium.
October 6, 2011
Oh my Dave! What on earth was this???
- “We nú viss woz cummin…”
- Sorry?
- “U awl no viss, U muss taykup ve nú wä aw Nú Lundun wil nevah B bilt. U muss follo ve Búk aw U wil leev Am…”
OK this definitively is not printing error which is what I thought when I suddenly found myself stuck in the landfill of incomprehensible combination of crippled words (that seems to have some remote connection with English) and numbers which then supposed to have some actual meaning. Which supposed to be the language itself. The language in which good part of this book is written.
What a nightmare! I should stress that English is not my mother tongue and since I live in the country where English is a foreign language I’m not too familiar with slang and modern double meanings etc. So you can’t imagine how frustrating this was for me. I was looking at the pages of the dialog I don’t understand. Didn’t know how to decipher what it says until the moment when I was out of sheer desperation start to read aloud imitating (how I thought) some illiterate Lundun bum (would speak). And it worked! While I couldn’t understand what I was reading I did understand what I was listening. The fact that I was listening myself reading the text I couldn’t understand was somehow irrelevant.
This horrible “language” is Mokni. Luckily there is Arpee, sophisticated speech (opposite of Mokni) in which narrator of the book speaks. And that language has normal words: Words like “drivers” then “motos”, “toyist”, “queers”, “screen”, “MadeinChina”, “lawyer”, “lettuce”, “intercom”, “irony”, “fare”, “flying”... etc but there was something utterly twisted with the sentences with those words. They didn’t have any sense to me so I was thinking “NOW what?”
Oh well, those and many, many other words you are familiar with and are using have completely different meaning in Arpee. Yes they do! Isn’t that just (sorry) fucking fantastic!? It’s 500+ pages of combination of some raped and twisted language you just can’t read and something that you can read perfectly but cannot understand! I so wanted to nail this book to the wall of my room. It became personal: This book hates me! And I wanted to hate the book likewise … but ….
… truth, “The Book of Dave” will rape your brain, will torture you on so many levels, will spit and scream and mock your non-English ear but after the last page you WILL forgive everything because the book is so bloody amazing!
Present and distant future interweaves, kind of pre- and post-apocalyptic vision of England (London), religious fanaticism, cancelling individuality, oppression, genetic engineering, lack of empathy, misogyny, violence, environmentalism, dark humour … what a mishmash! What an original idea and yes, fantastically executed.
This book should be read more than once for sure but to be honest I don’t see myself rereading it anytime soon. And no, I don’t have a clue to whom I would recommend it: both, best friend and worst enemy qualify equally.
- “We nú viss woz cummin…”
- Sorry?
- “U awl no viss, U muss taykup ve nú wä aw Nú Lundun wil nevah B bilt. U muss follo ve Búk aw U wil leev Am…”
OK this definitively is not printing error which is what I thought when I suddenly found myself stuck in the landfill of incomprehensible combination of crippled words (that seems to have some remote connection with English) and numbers which then supposed to have some actual meaning. Which supposed to be the language itself. The language in which good part of this book is written.
What a nightmare! I should stress that English is not my mother tongue and since I live in the country where English is a foreign language I’m not too familiar with slang and modern double meanings etc. So you can’t imagine how frustrating this was for me. I was looking at the pages of the dialog I don’t understand. Didn’t know how to decipher what it says until the moment when I was out of sheer desperation start to read aloud imitating (how I thought) some illiterate Lundun bum (would speak). And it worked! While I couldn’t understand what I was reading I did understand what I was listening. The fact that I was listening myself reading the text I couldn’t understand was somehow irrelevant.
This horrible “language” is Mokni. Luckily there is Arpee, sophisticated speech (opposite of Mokni) in which narrator of the book speaks. And that language has normal words: Words like “drivers” then “motos”, “toyist”, “queers”, “screen”, “MadeinChina”, “lawyer”, “lettuce”, “intercom”, “irony”, “fare”, “flying”... etc but there was something utterly twisted with the sentences with those words. They didn’t have any sense to me so I was thinking “NOW what?”
Oh well, those and many, many other words you are familiar with and are using have completely different meaning in Arpee. Yes they do! Isn’t that just (sorry) fucking fantastic!? It’s 500+ pages of combination of some raped and twisted language you just can’t read and something that you can read perfectly but cannot understand! I so wanted to nail this book to the wall of my room. It became personal: This book hates me! And I wanted to hate the book likewise … but ….
… truth, “The Book of Dave” will rape your brain, will torture you on so many levels, will spit and scream and mock your non-English ear but after the last page you WILL forgive everything because the book is so bloody amazing!
Present and distant future interweaves, kind of pre- and post-apocalyptic vision of England (London), religious fanaticism, cancelling individuality, oppression, genetic engineering, lack of empathy, misogyny, violence, environmentalism, dark humour … what a mishmash! What an original idea and yes, fantastically executed.
This book should be read more than once for sure but to be honest I don’t see myself rereading it anytime soon. And no, I don’t have a clue to whom I would recommend it: both, best friend and worst enemy qualify equally.
May 17, 2018
This very odd book it is only Will Self I have been able to get into which because this is dark creepy science fiction Apocalyptic style book about religion and Taxi drivers .
The famous Knowledge that all Taxi drivers must know in London to become black cab driver now 500ys in the future is a Bible.
This is black comedy at its best & was my top book of 2006
Some people may believe it is anti religion but proves just what could happen like the 100, TV series, Walking Dead, this a what if book that shows mankind as very silly & very easily to believe the wrong thing.
We have the present with Dave & his life & Dave's mistakes that change London 500ys from now.
This got all humour of The Movie of Peter Cooke's The Bed Sitting Room a classic comedy about radioactive fallout when some one is turned into a bed sitting room .
The famous Knowledge that all Taxi drivers must know in London to become black cab driver now 500ys in the future is a Bible.
This is black comedy at its best & was my top book of 2006
Some people may believe it is anti religion but proves just what could happen like the 100, TV series, Walking Dead, this a what if book that shows mankind as very silly & very easily to believe the wrong thing.
We have the present with Dave & his life & Dave's mistakes that change London 500ys from now.
This got all humour of The Movie of Peter Cooke's The Bed Sitting Room a classic comedy about radioactive fallout when some one is turned into a bed sitting room .
Want to read
December 20, 2008I've had this book for nearly a year two three years, now. I have started it twice five six times. It's not Will's fault I get distracted.
But it is Will's fault that he cribbed (read: ransacked) Russell Hoban's Riddley Walker, which I couldn't get through...
Speaking of distractions, in the middle of writing this unreview, some kid knocked on the door looking for his dog. After I went through a brilliant comic monologue describing all the dogs I had seen that day ("This big, gray...this big, black...this big, brown...was he...was he this big?") the kid asked me for a cigarette.
I explained that I underwent hypnosis ("Quite by accident..Somebody else--can you believe it?--was being hypnotized. They didn't kick. I did. Funny thing.") and kicked the habit.
"Hope you find your dog, man."
"My name's Brad," he said, offering one of the soggiest hands I'd ever...the other hand was in a bandage, prolly stewing up nice and grossly.
***
What about...the working class?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WLToN2...
But it is Will's fault that he cribbed (read: ransacked) Russell Hoban's Riddley Walker, which I couldn't get through...
Speaking of distractions, in the middle of writing this unreview, some kid knocked on the door looking for his dog. After I went through a brilliant comic monologue describing all the dogs I had seen that day ("This big, gray...this big, black...this big, brown...was he...was he this big?") the kid asked me for a cigarette.
I explained that I underwent hypnosis ("Quite by accident..Somebody else--can you believe it?--was being hypnotized. They didn't kick. I did. Funny thing.") and kicked the habit.
"Hope you find your dog, man."
"My name's Brad," he said, offering one of the soggiest hands I'd ever...the other hand was in a bandage, prolly stewing up nice and grossly.
***
What about...the working class?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WLToN2...
March 28, 2009
A bigoted, misogynist bastard of a London cabbie buries his angry manifesto, and 500 years later the book becomes the basis for a new society after the fall of civilization. This was a very interesting book, and Self builds an interesting future world. This is NOT, however, an easy book to read. Present and future chapters alternate, and the Daveists speak in decayed phonetic Cockney English. In fact, I had a lot of trouble with the unfamiliar British slang, although I probably pieced together most of it. (reading Riddley Walker helped!)
September 8, 2009
I'm putting this on my "read" list with a caveat. I got about 1/4 of the way through and had to stop. I wasn't enjoying it, first of all; I had very little attachment to any of the characters.
Parts of the book, which take place in a futuristic version of London, are written in a phonetic version of Cockney English. It took me several chapters of sllllooooowww reading to get into the rhythm of it. Events switch back and forth between 90s London and London (Lundun) of the future, and you must attempt to decipher the culture, traditions and relationships of the futuristic version with little to go on. I assume that it all becomes clearer as the events of the present unfold. Nevertheless, it required entirely too much of the little energy I have the end of the day, when I have time to read, to expend upon this book.
I may pick it up at another time, but I've got so much on my to-read list already, it might be relagated to a dusty shelf somewhere.
Parts of the book, which take place in a futuristic version of London, are written in a phonetic version of Cockney English. It took me several chapters of sllllooooowww reading to get into the rhythm of it. Events switch back and forth between 90s London and London (Lundun) of the future, and you must attempt to decipher the culture, traditions and relationships of the futuristic version with little to go on. I assume that it all becomes clearer as the events of the present unfold. Nevertheless, it required entirely too much of the little energy I have the end of the day, when I have time to read, to expend upon this book.
I may pick it up at another time, but I've got so much on my to-read list already, it might be relagated to a dusty shelf somewhere.
September 21, 2008
Yew mus read viz buk, or b trussed up az moto slorterd on a flying charj...
Weird and wonderful, this tale starts as two disparate threads of narrative, seemingly nothing connecting save the odd word or concept here or there. Dave, our humble cabbie, present day London, like many cabbies holds the runs of streets and points of interest in his mind. Runs and points. His life unravels around him as a tale of urban dysfunction, but his Knowledge of London helps somehow. Dave's narrative voice slips into dark, cynical, unspoken (italics actually) thoughts, which creep in quite often, showing us how cracked this guy really is. How could he be linked to the second parallel narrative of this book?
The isle of Ham is one of basic, religious and superstitious life. Strange gentle creatures called Motos, like large pigs but able to speak are companion to growing children, and life for these children is separated into time with mummies and then time with daddies, with a chanjova every week. Symun Devush grows up on Ham, and like all, he is a devout Davist. The book which forms the basis of their religion and all in the land of Ing, describes a rather harsh, separated, mysogynist way of being, and it's easy to see how the most fervent fanatics can excuse such behaviour all in the name of (in this case) Dave. Life is primitive on Ham, they look forward to the day they can be in Nu Lundun, and fear plays a large part in all.
It's dense, difficult, funny, and like Burgess' Clockwork Orange, needs a dictionary in the back for the words from Symun's world. It's worth referring to often, and the dialect comes naturally after a while. More than anything I am in awe of Will Self's "grand vision" for this book. It's not such a long book (400p?) but very clever and a wild ride.
Weird and wonderful, this tale starts as two disparate threads of narrative, seemingly nothing connecting save the odd word or concept here or there. Dave, our humble cabbie, present day London, like many cabbies holds the runs of streets and points of interest in his mind. Runs and points. His life unravels around him as a tale of urban dysfunction, but his Knowledge of London helps somehow. Dave's narrative voice slips into dark, cynical, unspoken (italics actually) thoughts, which creep in quite often, showing us how cracked this guy really is. How could he be linked to the second parallel narrative of this book?
The isle of Ham is one of basic, religious and superstitious life. Strange gentle creatures called Motos, like large pigs but able to speak are companion to growing children, and life for these children is separated into time with mummies and then time with daddies, with a chanjova every week. Symun Devush grows up on Ham, and like all, he is a devout Davist. The book which forms the basis of their religion and all in the land of Ing, describes a rather harsh, separated, mysogynist way of being, and it's easy to see how the most fervent fanatics can excuse such behaviour all in the name of (in this case) Dave. Life is primitive on Ham, they look forward to the day they can be in Nu Lundun, and fear plays a large part in all.
It's dense, difficult, funny, and like Burgess' Clockwork Orange, needs a dictionary in the back for the words from Symun's world. It's worth referring to often, and the dialect comes naturally after a while. More than anything I am in awe of Will Self's "grand vision" for this book. It's not such a long book (400p?) but very clever and a wild ride.
November 3, 2015
The Book of Dave isn't here to make your life as a reader easy. It's a book that kicks sand in the face of the casual, more easily distracted, reader. I first started it back in 2008, and I wasn't focused enough. The book became harder and harder to follow. So I gave up, less than a quarter of the way through, and popped it back on the shelf. Since then it has sat there, like a guilty secret, a book by one of my favourite authors – unfinished. Calling to me, mocking me, asking me if I felt happy with it sitting there unfinished on my bookcase.
It wasn't that I didn't like the book, I always wanted to finish it. But, the book is written in a deliberately confusing style and I got distracted. The chapters alternate between a 'present day' (early 2000s) and a future, post-apocalyptic, time. Both stories are set in London, but one is the London of the 1980-2000s, and the other is the London of the 500-520s AD (After Dave). The present-day story tells the tale of a London cabbie, Dave Rudman, a somewhat pathetic character who it seems you are to both pity and feel disgusted by, as he meets a woman, has a son, gets divorced, and has a total mental breakdown. During that breakdown Dave writes a book, his manifesto, and he buries it in the Hampstead back garden of his estranged wife for his son to find. The future chapters tell of a small village, Ham, where Hampstead used to be. The rest of London is flooded, and Dave's book has been discovered several hundred years ago before, and somehow, the ravings of a depressed cabbie have spawned an entire religion.
Not only do the chapters alternate between the two parallel stories, they also jump around in time. Neither story is told in a linear fashion, although both stories jump forwards and backwards in parallel. If this isn't going to be confusing enough, both stories are written with a phonetic approach to dialogue. The present-day characters speak a phonetic cockney that frequently has to be read aloud (at least in your head) to understand it. However, the future dialogue, Self has taken to a totally different level. Again, the dialogue is written phonetically, but it's a made-up 'mockni' language. As a crutch, of sorts, for the poor reader, Self has provided a glossary at the end so you can keep referring back to that when you hit a word you don't understand. But even then, lots of words aren't in the glossary. Some of these you can guess from context, others you have to read aloud (in your head isn't always good enough – cue strange looks on the bus), sometimes in a funny cockney accent, before your brain will make the connection and the conversation will become clear. As a final nail in the coffin of easy to understand dialogue, Self has dispensed with any form of quotation mark and instead you have to rely entirely on context to understand where the spoken sections start and stop. To be fair, the lack of quotation marks isn't nearly as limiting as you'd think – I soon barely noticed them not being there – and while the regularly flicking back to the glossary is hard work at first, as the book progresses you find yourself needing to do it less and less (so long as you're not getting distracted while you're reading that is).
The book is maybe a little longer than it needs to be, and maybe a little bit more confusing than it needs to be. But, the premise of the story is fascinating, and Self's love of language for its own sake shines through. The parallels between the two stories is expertly done – the more you read, the more you spot the hidden clues and connections. So many parallels could be explained just by the presence of the book of Dave, the future culture has been built entirely around his warped view of the world, their language is a degeneration of the already obtuse cockney spoken, and presumably written, by Dave himself. But Self takes it still further. You notice that some characters in the two stories have very similar names. Initially, I assumed this was coincidence, maybe they named themselves after people in the book, but as the story unfolds you realise that the parallels run much deeper than that. I'm glad that I forced myself to go back to it, and glad that I persevered when even this second reading seemed to be going so slowly – two weeks to read less than 500 pages is very slow for me.
It wasn't that I didn't like the book, I always wanted to finish it. But, the book is written in a deliberately confusing style and I got distracted. The chapters alternate between a 'present day' (early 2000s) and a future, post-apocalyptic, time. Both stories are set in London, but one is the London of the 1980-2000s, and the other is the London of the 500-520s AD (After Dave). The present-day story tells the tale of a London cabbie, Dave Rudman, a somewhat pathetic character who it seems you are to both pity and feel disgusted by, as he meets a woman, has a son, gets divorced, and has a total mental breakdown. During that breakdown Dave writes a book, his manifesto, and he buries it in the Hampstead back garden of his estranged wife for his son to find. The future chapters tell of a small village, Ham, where Hampstead used to be. The rest of London is flooded, and Dave's book has been discovered several hundred years ago before, and somehow, the ravings of a depressed cabbie have spawned an entire religion.
Not only do the chapters alternate between the two parallel stories, they also jump around in time. Neither story is told in a linear fashion, although both stories jump forwards and backwards in parallel. If this isn't going to be confusing enough, both stories are written with a phonetic approach to dialogue. The present-day characters speak a phonetic cockney that frequently has to be read aloud (at least in your head) to understand it. However, the future dialogue, Self has taken to a totally different level. Again, the dialogue is written phonetically, but it's a made-up 'mockni' language. As a crutch, of sorts, for the poor reader, Self has provided a glossary at the end so you can keep referring back to that when you hit a word you don't understand. But even then, lots of words aren't in the glossary. Some of these you can guess from context, others you have to read aloud (in your head isn't always good enough – cue strange looks on the bus), sometimes in a funny cockney accent, before your brain will make the connection and the conversation will become clear. As a final nail in the coffin of easy to understand dialogue, Self has dispensed with any form of quotation mark and instead you have to rely entirely on context to understand where the spoken sections start and stop. To be fair, the lack of quotation marks isn't nearly as limiting as you'd think – I soon barely noticed them not being there – and while the regularly flicking back to the glossary is hard work at first, as the book progresses you find yourself needing to do it less and less (so long as you're not getting distracted while you're reading that is).
The book is maybe a little longer than it needs to be, and maybe a little bit more confusing than it needs to be. But, the premise of the story is fascinating, and Self's love of language for its own sake shines through. The parallels between the two stories is expertly done – the more you read, the more you spot the hidden clues and connections. So many parallels could be explained just by the presence of the book of Dave, the future culture has been built entirely around his warped view of the world, their language is a degeneration of the already obtuse cockney spoken, and presumably written, by Dave himself. But Self takes it still further. You notice that some characters in the two stories have very similar names. Initially, I assumed this was coincidence, maybe they named themselves after people in the book, but as the story unfolds you realise that the parallels run much deeper than that. I'm glad that I forced myself to go back to it, and glad that I persevered when even this second reading seemed to be going so slowly – two weeks to read less than 500 pages is very slow for me.
May 9, 2018
"Where2guv"? London cabbie Dave Rudman is gotten with troubles marital and otherwise, he's squibbed a manifesto of 'knowledge' for his estranged son though the book reads rife with misogynistic malevolence withal the 'runs and points' of a cabbie's Knowledge/London town. Post-apocalyptic satire replete with created cockney vernacular and anthropomorphic creatures inhabiting an archipelago outpost of future England splits time in oscillation with that 21st century Dave who has become prophet and/or godhead through his left behind and dug up Book of Knowledge. Hey, so's it a slog of bollocks an' swipes at churchy ways immemorial - call to humanists and Cambell's hero journey landing Odysseus home to reclaim what's'is. It's Self's self churning out his brand, sluicing in ubiquitous Dr. Zack Busner, if ever so ephemerally yet so, and tipping the/a world topsy-turvy to get some jabs in while twisting the edge. Things evolve things die. Dave? Dave's not here.
Read
June 15, 2016One of the most difficult yet interesting read I've ever had!
No ratings as it's been 5 years I'm reading it (no shit), keep stoping and keep going back to it, because this book hurts my brain so much that I can't manage to stick to it for too long...but it's definitely NOT a bad book, quite the contrary.
I thank myself occasionally about picking this one in french for a change, because I can't imagine how tough it would be for me to read it in english - considering that it's already hard in my own language.
I'll finish it one day. You should start it.
No ratings as it's been 5 years I'm reading it (no shit), keep stoping and keep going back to it, because this book hurts my brain so much that I can't manage to stick to it for too long...but it's definitely NOT a bad book, quite the contrary.
I thank myself occasionally about picking this one in french for a change, because I can't imagine how tough it would be for me to read it in english - considering that it's already hard in my own language.
I'll finish it one day. You should start it.
April 9, 2021
Sort of a futuristic dystopian novel before that was all the rage. Usually I’m not much of a fan of this type of book, and this time was no different. It had some plucky parts and made me chuckle a few times, mainly with outlandish dialogue, however evaluating the book as a whole left me with very little passion one way or another. Just average for me.
August 24, 2022
Two stories based on one man, this book is long and depressing and then sort of softly gut-punches you at the end. One half of the chapters are devoted to Dave Rudman, a London cabbie who has very little ambition and few hierarchical needs until he accidentally fathers a son after a one-night stand. Apathy gives way to bemused ambivalence which slowly evolves into parental love at best and narcissistic obsession at worst, before spiraling into manic depression, which is where the storylines start to converge. About halfway through I wondered if the future chapters were a psychotic episode that a character was having in the past, instead of an actual tale of a far future society. My interpretation fluctuated several times throughout the rest of the book, but the future chapters were what kept my interest when the modern ones hit their stretch of tedium; if you pick up this book, flip first to the glossary in the back, and spend some time learning the Mokni language of Ham, or you'll be utterly lost. The linguistic creativity was definitely my favorite part of the book, followed by figuring out the obscure genesis of many of the words and phrases. Three stars is a little harsh for a rating, but since I can't separate actual plot & characters from literary devices, it ranks a three - I wouldn't recommend it to anyone whose literary tastes didn't occasionally veer into the somewhat bizarre.
May 17, 2015
Only read the "Dave" parts on the re-read as they were of interest to my writing :) but I might add star #5 back on once I read (all the way through) AGAIN, which would be read #3!! That's how dense and interesting this book is.
But not without its flaws. I can tell that a lot of the fun of this book is supposed to arise from drawing the parallels between Dave's world and the After Dave world (or whatever it's called) but I didn't find the After Dave world compelling enough to deconstruct. But maybe I will next time I read.
Nevertheless, the life of Dave is standalone fascinating. It isn't a story untold, but the rich detail the characters and setting are given, as well as the contemporary relevance of the story (Fathers for Justice debacle) makes it original and heartbreakingly true. Whether or not a cabbie's life played out exactly like this, each part happened to someone- that's tragic.
Self has a supernatural empathetic capacity that he uses here to give life to those Londoners otherwise dismissed.
Highly recommended :)
But not without its flaws. I can tell that a lot of the fun of this book is supposed to arise from drawing the parallels between Dave's world and the After Dave world (or whatever it's called) but I didn't find the After Dave world compelling enough to deconstruct. But maybe I will next time I read.
Nevertheless, the life of Dave is standalone fascinating. It isn't a story untold, but the rich detail the characters and setting are given, as well as the contemporary relevance of the story (Fathers for Justice debacle) makes it original and heartbreakingly true. Whether or not a cabbie's life played out exactly like this, each part happened to someone- that's tragic.
Self has a supernatural empathetic capacity that he uses here to give life to those Londoners otherwise dismissed.
Highly recommended :)
May 24, 2016
I really enjoyed this book. It is a strange, sad satire about a London cabdriver who becomes mentally unhinged when his wife leaves him for another man and puts a restraining order against him. Dave starts really losing it when he feels he is losing his beloved boy. Although Dave is a sympathetic character and we root for him, it begins to be clear throughout the novel that he was also abusive towards his wife and son. His violent rages make him go through cycles of guilt, despair and uncontrolled anger. Dave sort of redeems himself at the end, but the notebooks he fills with crazy rantings during his episodes of mental collapse, are buried and then found 500 years later, when they are taken as Gospel. It is reminiscent of the story of the Mormon religion and enough clues are dispersed through the book as to inspiration for Dave's purported "code" of law stemming from Mormonism. I recommend it; it is an engrossing read although the parts that take place 500 from now are somewhat difficult to read and it takes a bit to get the hang of the futuristic English language.
April 29, 2017
This was unfortunately a disappointment. I will try and read it a second time at some point, as I am sure I will get more from it with repeated readings, but this started off difficult and never really was comfortable (or completely enjoyable) reading.
The book follows a London taxi driver called Dave, who struggles with his sanity as his marriage breaks up and he is prevented access to his son. There is the usual wit and intelligence as I'd expect of Will Self, lots of observation and wonderful turns of phrase. However, the book also follows an antediluvian society long in a primitive future of London, a society which bases it's religion on a buried book written by the aforementioned taxi driver, a book he wrote for his son and buried in a garden.
It's an interesting idea, and Self's writing is rich and often delightful. However the novel falls down for me due to the style in which the 'future society' is written. Lots of clever, but difficult to understand, derived terms and phonetically written dialogue in a cockney style. This made it really hard to follow and very long-winded reading. The design of the book in having alternating chapters from the two timelines made it even harder - just when you were starting to get used to the style in which the future society sections were written, it shifted back to a more conventional style for a while (so you never get properly acclimatised). Consequently the majority of the second half of the book I skimmed some of.
It hasn't put me off Will Self, but it has reminded me to be cautious about his novels. His more linear stuff, as far as he does 'linear', I feel able to enjoy more.
The book follows a London taxi driver called Dave, who struggles with his sanity as his marriage breaks up and he is prevented access to his son. There is the usual wit and intelligence as I'd expect of Will Self, lots of observation and wonderful turns of phrase. However, the book also follows an antediluvian society long in a primitive future of London, a society which bases it's religion on a buried book written by the aforementioned taxi driver, a book he wrote for his son and buried in a garden.
It's an interesting idea, and Self's writing is rich and often delightful. However the novel falls down for me due to the style in which the 'future society' is written. Lots of clever, but difficult to understand, derived terms and phonetically written dialogue in a cockney style. This made it really hard to follow and very long-winded reading. The design of the book in having alternating chapters from the two timelines made it even harder - just when you were starting to get used to the style in which the future society sections were written, it shifted back to a more conventional style for a while (so you never get properly acclimatised). Consequently the majority of the second half of the book I skimmed some of.
It hasn't put me off Will Self, but it has reminded me to be cautious about his novels. His more linear stuff, as far as he does 'linear', I feel able to enjoy more.
January 1, 2020
A hangover from last year really. I took my time reading this book. It doesn't mean I didn't enjoy it. It's funny in places. You'd almost feel sorry for the black taxi drivers that are as familiar as the red route buses in London.
This is more than just a story about a taxi driver though. Sometimes the language is a bit strange, phonetic in places but at the end there is a glossary of the terms used in the AD chapters. I assume, although I can't say for certain that AD stands for After Dave. It will be come more apparent as the story unfolds.
This is more than just a story about a taxi driver though. Sometimes the language is a bit strange, phonetic in places but at the end there is a glossary of the terms used in the AD chapters. I assume, although I can't say for certain that AD stands for After Dave. It will be come more apparent as the story unfolds.
April 25, 2016
I had to read The Book of Dave as part of my London in Literature course when I was studying creative writing at Roehampton University. It was a good book, and a great introduction to a new style of writing that I’d never really come across before, a sort of gonzo–futurism where Self is able to use the passage of time as a catalyst for a rethought approach to life, society and religion.
Effectively, the Book of Dave is a written document by a London cab driver with high rage levels and a mental illness, which was taken out of context and used to form a new religion, with hilarious (and tragic) consequences. Interestingly, the people of the future have adopted some of the cabby’s dialectical patterns, and so the novel can be hard to read from time to time. It comes with a glossary, so you can clarify anything that you don’t understand, and for me, it’s reminiscent of reading Irvine Welsh – you have to concentrate, but that’s part of its charm.
Not everyone has had similar reactions, though – a lot of my fellow students ended up abandoning the book before the end, which is forgiveable when you consider how many pages it has, and how tough it can be to work your way through it. Still, it’s the sort of book that’s worth persevering with, because there’s more to it than meets the eye – at its heart, it’s a clever commentary on both the way that our society operates today, and the way that religion has historically influenced us, as a species.
In many ways, it’s a post-apocalyptic novel – the story veers between the present and the distant future, after a series of great floods reduced civilisation to ruins. Interestingly, the plot seems almost sparse – it comes second to the linguistic innovation that Self displays in his language, and in the way that he illustrates the misunderstandings that took place to develop the ramblings of a mentally ill taxi driver and to turn it into a religion.
Hey, we’ve seen religions that have based their dogma on even crazier stuff, so why not? But the funny thing is, whilst the religion that Self depicts isn’t exactly the most pleasant of religions, it doesn’t really feel as though he’s trying to make a statement – it’s more like he’s just taken things to their logicial conclusion and presented them to you in an unbiased way.
So would I recommend this book? Yes, but only to certain types of people – if you have an open mind, and if you like to ask questions, and if you like to read alternative literature then you’re sure to enjoy it. But if not, then I wouldn’t recommend it because you just won’t enjoy it – you’ll struggle, and the book will take its toll. Sometimes it’s worth just soldiering on!
Effectively, the Book of Dave is a written document by a London cab driver with high rage levels and a mental illness, which was taken out of context and used to form a new religion, with hilarious (and tragic) consequences. Interestingly, the people of the future have adopted some of the cabby’s dialectical patterns, and so the novel can be hard to read from time to time. It comes with a glossary, so you can clarify anything that you don’t understand, and for me, it’s reminiscent of reading Irvine Welsh – you have to concentrate, but that’s part of its charm.
Not everyone has had similar reactions, though – a lot of my fellow students ended up abandoning the book before the end, which is forgiveable when you consider how many pages it has, and how tough it can be to work your way through it. Still, it’s the sort of book that’s worth persevering with, because there’s more to it than meets the eye – at its heart, it’s a clever commentary on both the way that our society operates today, and the way that religion has historically influenced us, as a species.
In many ways, it’s a post-apocalyptic novel – the story veers between the present and the distant future, after a series of great floods reduced civilisation to ruins. Interestingly, the plot seems almost sparse – it comes second to the linguistic innovation that Self displays in his language, and in the way that he illustrates the misunderstandings that took place to develop the ramblings of a mentally ill taxi driver and to turn it into a religion.
Hey, we’ve seen religions that have based their dogma on even crazier stuff, so why not? But the funny thing is, whilst the religion that Self depicts isn’t exactly the most pleasant of religions, it doesn’t really feel as though he’s trying to make a statement – it’s more like he’s just taken things to their logicial conclusion and presented them to you in an unbiased way.
So would I recommend this book? Yes, but only to certain types of people – if you have an open mind, and if you like to ask questions, and if you like to read alternative literature then you’re sure to enjoy it. But if not, then I wouldn’t recommend it because you just won’t enjoy it – you’ll struggle, and the book will take its toll. Sometimes it’s worth just soldiering on!
October 28, 2017
Books of 500 pages may appear larger than they really are.
This is a book in my favourite genre of "annoying pretentious fuckery", which took me too long to read, but was definitely worth it. Also, it is about an (anti)utopia built on a taxi driver's worldview, which should be reason enough to read it.
All in all, it was as annoying as the first chapters hinted to (which is ok) and a bit less pretentious than would appear from its opening (which is a pity). To sum it up, it is elaborate in language, structure and techniques, but quite straightforward in its plot and (let's say) idea.
(Here's half a plot with spoilers: London cab driver's personal life falls apart (he breaks up with his wife and is prevented from seeing his son). Depressed, drugged and - truth be told - mad, he writes a book (The Book) that comes to him as a revelation - a vision of a future society based on his cabdriver's Knowledge of the city and his misogynistic views on child rearing. Then he gets better, loses his women-hating views and, wanting to make up to his son, writes a second book in which he dispells his former views and proclaims his new humanist credo. Then the apocalypse comes.)
This is a book in my favourite genre of "annoying pretentious fuckery", which took me too long to read, but was definitely worth it. Also, it is about an (anti)utopia built on a taxi driver's worldview, which should be reason enough to read it.
All in all, it was as annoying as the first chapters hinted to (which is ok) and a bit less pretentious than would appear from its opening (which is a pity). To sum it up, it is elaborate in language, structure and techniques, but quite straightforward in its plot and (let's say) idea.
(Here's half a plot with spoilers: London cab driver's personal life falls apart (he breaks up with his wife and is prevented from seeing his son). Depressed, drugged and - truth be told - mad, he writes a book (The Book) that comes to him as a revelation - a vision of a future society based on his cabdriver's Knowledge of the city and his misogynistic views on child rearing. Then he gets better, loses his women-hating views and, wanting to make up to his son, writes a second book in which he dispells his former views and proclaims his new humanist credo. Then the apocalypse comes.)
August 1, 2012
I just could not get into this book. It didn't draw me in and it did more than turn me off...it made itself purposefully obscure and difficult, practically pushing me away from it!
As I get older, I don't have as much patience for books that make me WORK to understand them. Makes me sound like a moron, I know, but life is too short for me to spend my pleasure time reading a manifesto left behind by a bitter, angry man. Nope. I've got better things to do.
Oh, and in all honesty, I did not finish it. It was that unpleasant for me. I usually stick with something in hopes that it pays off. I mean, someone spent an awful lot of time coming up with it and writing it. I respect that. I just didn't like it.
As I get older, I don't have as much patience for books that make me WORK to understand them. Makes me sound like a moron, I know, but life is too short for me to spend my pleasure time reading a manifesto left behind by a bitter, angry man. Nope. I've got better things to do.
Oh, and in all honesty, I did not finish it. It was that unpleasant for me. I usually stick with something in hopes that it pays off. I mean, someone spent an awful lot of time coming up with it and writing it. I respect that. I just didn't like it.
August 28, 2021
A strange story, quite the feat of imagination. Or the product of a somewhat disturbed mind. It's large-scale, with a changing timeline (but not really confusing in that), with existential and religious themes. I think the same idea in many other hands could have easily been just silly and overdone, and would have ended up as just another of the hundreds of dystopia-type novels with their grand illusions. But Will Self kept the focus quite personal, and created a strange and convincing world for it, without the need to drown everything in elaborate detail.
February 25, 2021
Dave Rudman is a London cabbie, and he is not a happy man. The wrong side of 40 and going to seed, balding and divorced from ‘Chelle, a woman he married out of a sense of guilt after getting her knocked up on a one night stand. The only thing in the world he cares about is Carl, the product of that ill-advised union.
Dave also has strong opinions. Some of the things he has opinions about are black people and Asians, Moslems, Jews and homosexuals. And women. Dave has a lot of views on women. He wants Carl to learn about his views, the way dads are supposed to teach their sons. But a restraining order prevents him from seeing the boy and they communicate only by text message.
So he writes it all down in a book. And in a moment of madness, he buries the book in the garden of the Hampstead home that ‘Chelle and Carl now share with her new husband.
Then global warming causes the seas to rise, and London and all the other low lying areas of the Earth are flooded. Crops fail, resources run dry, and humanity regresses to a pre-technological way of life. Then one day, on the island of Ham, someone digs up Dave’s book, and sees in it a set of rules for life that promise a return to the old ways, to glory days of the human race.
Five hundred years later, Dave’s book is the holy text of the dominant religion. Across the land, everyone lives by Dave’s rules on pain of exile, torture or death. A New London is being built, based on a rigid class system where everyone knows their place. But some people are starting to rebel.
The first thing to say about any Will Self book is that, love him or hate him, you can’t help but be impressed by the quality of his writing. Self loves words the way other people love their children, and he can take the most mundane action and turn it into epic poetry. The prose in this book is astonishing, and even thought that can sometimes make it not the easiest read, you don’t want to stop reading nonetheless.
But the characterisation is equally impressive. Dave is no one-dimensional villain, he is sad, pathetic and clearly mentally disturbed. His racism, homophobia and misogyny take the form of scorn rather than hatred. His hatred he reserves purely for himself. His life has been a series of wrong turns, and he lashes out at others so that he doesn’t have to admit that the fault is all his.
Meanwhile the future world, while hardly realistic, works on several levels. Most obviously it is a satire on religious fundamentalism, and the cynicism of those who would corrupt it for their own advancement. But it also acts as a parallel world where Self can comment on our own society from a distance, reminiscent in a way of Pratchett’s Discworld or the alternative world of Stephen King’s Dark Tower novels.
Dialogue in the future sections is written in Mokni, a made-up language consisting of phonetically spelled out cockney interspersed with cabbie speak. Religious leaders are “drivers” and their congregation “fares”, and instead of hello or how are you, people greet each other with a cheerful “where2guv?” As with most invented languages, it becomes easy to read once you have got into the rhythm, but getting there can be a bit of a slog.
Overall, if you are looking to get into Self’s writing this is about as accessible as he gets, making it a good place to start.
Dave also has strong opinions. Some of the things he has opinions about are black people and Asians, Moslems, Jews and homosexuals. And women. Dave has a lot of views on women. He wants Carl to learn about his views, the way dads are supposed to teach their sons. But a restraining order prevents him from seeing the boy and they communicate only by text message.
So he writes it all down in a book. And in a moment of madness, he buries the book in the garden of the Hampstead home that ‘Chelle and Carl now share with her new husband.
Then global warming causes the seas to rise, and London and all the other low lying areas of the Earth are flooded. Crops fail, resources run dry, and humanity regresses to a pre-technological way of life. Then one day, on the island of Ham, someone digs up Dave’s book, and sees in it a set of rules for life that promise a return to the old ways, to glory days of the human race.
Five hundred years later, Dave’s book is the holy text of the dominant religion. Across the land, everyone lives by Dave’s rules on pain of exile, torture or death. A New London is being built, based on a rigid class system where everyone knows their place. But some people are starting to rebel.
The first thing to say about any Will Self book is that, love him or hate him, you can’t help but be impressed by the quality of his writing. Self loves words the way other people love their children, and he can take the most mundane action and turn it into epic poetry. The prose in this book is astonishing, and even thought that can sometimes make it not the easiest read, you don’t want to stop reading nonetheless.
But the characterisation is equally impressive. Dave is no one-dimensional villain, he is sad, pathetic and clearly mentally disturbed. His racism, homophobia and misogyny take the form of scorn rather than hatred. His hatred he reserves purely for himself. His life has been a series of wrong turns, and he lashes out at others so that he doesn’t have to admit that the fault is all his.
Meanwhile the future world, while hardly realistic, works on several levels. Most obviously it is a satire on religious fundamentalism, and the cynicism of those who would corrupt it for their own advancement. But it also acts as a parallel world where Self can comment on our own society from a distance, reminiscent in a way of Pratchett’s Discworld or the alternative world of Stephen King’s Dark Tower novels.
Dialogue in the future sections is written in Mokni, a made-up language consisting of phonetically spelled out cockney interspersed with cabbie speak. Religious leaders are “drivers” and their congregation “fares”, and instead of hello or how are you, people greet each other with a cheerful “where2guv?” As with most invented languages, it becomes easy to read once you have got into the rhythm, but getting there can be a bit of a slog.
Overall, if you are looking to get into Self’s writing this is about as accessible as he gets, making it a good place to start.
April 21, 2012
Another brilliant book by Will Self. In this book a bitter and slightly unhinged London cabbie in the middle of a custody battle writes a book of advice for his son to find and read. He later regrets this embittered rant but nevertheless, hundreds of years later after a natural disaster has destroyed Britain, his book is found and used as a basis to rebuild society. Parents live apart and children spent equal time with each parent with the 'changeover' occuring on Wednesdays, religious leaders are called 'Drivers' and the day is split into 'Tariffs' to mimic the price structure of the London cabs.
It's certainly not an easy book to read to begin with and you have to work quite hard to understand some of the language used in the future chapters as it is a mixture of phonetic Cockney, taxi-driver terminology and the language adopted by the imaginary society that have embraced Dave's doctrine. There's a glossary at the back of the book to help you become accustomed to the language and it does make reading the first chapter a little slow. Also, the narrative of alternate chapters switch between the recent past and to the future - however, each visit to each time period doesn't happen chronologically so you find yourself jumping around in time as Self reveals the story in pieces.
It is definitely worth the effort though because understanding the language becomes easier as you get used to it and, as usual, Self provides an interesting story and somehow creates seemingly unpleasant and revolting characters that you nevertheless begin to identify with and like. Dave Rudman, the eponymous hero, is a typical Self character: over-weight, smelly, prejudiced and a poor husband, a poor father and a poor son. Nevertheless, the reader cannot help but like him because of his vulnerability and his attempt to uphold his own moral code.
Well worth reading.
It's certainly not an easy book to read to begin with and you have to work quite hard to understand some of the language used in the future chapters as it is a mixture of phonetic Cockney, taxi-driver terminology and the language adopted by the imaginary society that have embraced Dave's doctrine. There's a glossary at the back of the book to help you become accustomed to the language and it does make reading the first chapter a little slow. Also, the narrative of alternate chapters switch between the recent past and to the future - however, each visit to each time period doesn't happen chronologically so you find yourself jumping around in time as Self reveals the story in pieces.
It is definitely worth the effort though because understanding the language becomes easier as you get used to it and, as usual, Self provides an interesting story and somehow creates seemingly unpleasant and revolting characters that you nevertheless begin to identify with and like. Dave Rudman, the eponymous hero, is a typical Self character: over-weight, smelly, prejudiced and a poor husband, a poor father and a poor son. Nevertheless, the reader cannot help but like him because of his vulnerability and his attempt to uphold his own moral code.
Well worth reading.
January 26, 2013
Hundreds of years into the future, people discover a ranting book written by a disturbed present-day bigot, and model their lives around the ‘truths’ it contains. Will Self’s book is told as two narratives, how London cab-driver Dave’s utterly miserable life lead him to write his rant, and how the future race live their lives according to The Book of Dave.
The present-day story is full of brutally honest descriptions of unsympathetic characters, foolish decisions and bad luck. The streets of London are described with a visceral life of their own. However, I can’t say much about the future chapters because I have to admit that I gave up on them, mainly because I couldn’t keep up the effort it took for me translate the dialect it was written in. (I wonder if this would make a more satisfactory audio book?) As I struggled with page after page of dialect I kept worrying whether it was me, have I become a lazy reader unable to give an intelligent book the attention it deserves, or has Will Self just gone a step too far?
I still love the premise of the book, but it was a disappointing and uncomfortable read.
The present-day story is full of brutally honest descriptions of unsympathetic characters, foolish decisions and bad luck. The streets of London are described with a visceral life of their own. However, I can’t say much about the future chapters because I have to admit that I gave up on them, mainly because I couldn’t keep up the effort it took for me translate the dialect it was written in. (I wonder if this would make a more satisfactory audio book?) As I struggled with page after page of dialect I kept worrying whether it was me, have I become a lazy reader unable to give an intelligent book the attention it deserves, or has Will Self just gone a step too far?
I still love the premise of the book, but it was a disappointing and uncomfortable read.
April 16, 2009
I really enjoyed this book. Many people here and elsewhere have complained about the language being too difficult to understand, I however found it to be very entertaining. Many of the terms employed for everyday objects got a laugh out of me; water is 'evian', breakfast is 'starbucks', etc etc. That being said, the Mokni language isn't exactly easy to read, but if read aloud it isn't a problem in the least bit, and actually grew on me over the course of the book; it was a nice touch of realism, and kept my brain on its toes (eww).
All laughs aside, the book, while containing many elements bordering on fantasy, is quite serious in its message and delivery. At times the tale turns quite dark indeed.
The book also reminds me of The Dark Tower series from Stephen King in some vague ways, I'd imagine most fans of that series would also enjoy Self's post-apocalyptic adventure.
All laughs aside, the book, while containing many elements bordering on fantasy, is quite serious in its message and delivery. At times the tale turns quite dark indeed.
The book also reminds me of The Dark Tower series from Stephen King in some vague ways, I'd imagine most fans of that series would also enjoy Self's post-apocalyptic adventure.
August 29, 2008
I very much enjoy Will Self, even if I don't understand how he ever got published. When it comes right down to it, he writes science fiction, but he writes it with such intelligence and wit, it's easy to forget that's what you're reading!
This one was my first Father's Day gift, and a perfect one at that. It is a father's tale, in the worst possible way.
Dave is a racist, prejudiced and increasingly insane cab driver in London. After a brutal divorce and separation from his son, he decides to write a book of knowledge for his son. Meanwhile, centuries into the future, it turns out his book was somehow integrated as a religion that now runs the world! Wackiness ensues.
Another challenging read (some of the future-speak gets a little rough), but certainly worth the time it takes.
This one was my first Father's Day gift, and a perfect one at that. It is a father's tale, in the worst possible way.
Dave is a racist, prejudiced and increasingly insane cab driver in London. After a brutal divorce and separation from his son, he decides to write a book of knowledge for his son. Meanwhile, centuries into the future, it turns out his book was somehow integrated as a religion that now runs the world! Wackiness ensues.
Another challenging read (some of the future-speak gets a little rough), but certainly worth the time it takes.
March 11, 2014
The world in this one is wonderfully imagined and I love the interplay between elements in the past and future. The dialect gave me fits though. I have enough trouble understanding cockney, much less a post apocalyptic version of it. Gave me quite a bit of trouble.
August 4, 2018
a really great, morbid satire. touches on a few various themes, the primary theme being religious doctrine. this one's the most obvious interpretation of the novel; it asks questions about the nature of religion and the restrictiveness of ideology, the brilliantly realised details of the society of Ham (Hampstead) fully-fledged and eerily convincing, the idiosyncratic cultural allusions in the Mokni dialect ("starbuck" for breakfast, "evian" for water etc.) make it funnier and easier to grasp than some of these reviewers will lead you to believe. Basically, Dave Rudman, a racist, sexist cabbie, has written a book to his son in a state of desperation decreeing his grand truths about society, morality, and ethics. The book cuts between a narrative from the point of view of Dave in the present day, and the London he has inadvertently spawned when the book is dug up and hailed as a religious text, and is the entire foundation of the city (which, in the future, has been completely flooded and has become a series of islands.) I thought the book touched on the question of religious totalitarianism very starkly and wryly; how much authority do sacred texts have? How much of it is about the powerful maintaining their power and keeping you in your place? Is it worth risking your sovereignty in this society to speak up against doctrines that offend your soul?
I liked this book and I found it funny, dark, playfully nihilistic and of course linguistically beautiful. This is the only work of Self's I've read (apart from a few short stories), but I can see that he's a much-needed satirist of our fucked up times, unafraid of political agitation, unafraid to question the powers that be and the structures we take for granted. I did, at times, find this book a little hollow, a little too planned and contrived and smart... something about the whole Biting Nihilistic Satire school of lit I guess just feels very limited to me. I think ultimately I prefer chaos, books that don't propose answers as such but ask questions. This book felt somewhat moralistic and at times utterly dry and overly ambitious, especially considering how flaccid the ending was. But I recommend it to anyone who's into William Burroughs, Chuck Palahniuk or Kurt Vonnegut. Review over fucking finally.
I liked this book and I found it funny, dark, playfully nihilistic and of course linguistically beautiful. This is the only work of Self's I've read (apart from a few short stories), but I can see that he's a much-needed satirist of our fucked up times, unafraid of political agitation, unafraid to question the powers that be and the structures we take for granted. I did, at times, find this book a little hollow, a little too planned and contrived and smart... something about the whole Biting Nihilistic Satire school of lit I guess just feels very limited to me. I think ultimately I prefer chaos, books that don't propose answers as such but ask questions. This book felt somewhat moralistic and at times utterly dry and overly ambitious, especially considering how flaccid the ending was. But I recommend it to anyone who's into William Burroughs, Chuck Palahniuk or Kurt Vonnegut. Review over fucking finally.
June 3, 2017
The chapters about Dave were very good, but the futuristic narrative, while funny for a chapter or two, was a slog, especially with the ridiculous Mockni dialogue.
Not sure what this story was supposed to be about.
Not sure what this story was supposed to be about.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
May 28, 2025
Self is such an imaginative writer and this is him at his most creative. Despite really enjoying his work I can’t shake the idea that his obviously superior brain would sneer at mine in disgust as I wrestle with the finer points of his narrative.
August 17, 2017
A catchy little theological work which rather explains how often prophets can be misinterpreted.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 400 reviews