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Ron Peters's Reviews > Flaubert's Parrot
Flaubert's Parrot
by
by
“Me and my books, in the same apartment: like a gherkin in its vinegar.” Gustave Flaubert, 1842.
I showed this line to Tena. She laughed and said, “Hah! That’s you!” 😊
This is yet another from David Bowie’s list of favorite books. Having read a number of these, I’ve loved some and loathed others. This one is delightfully quirky, erudite, and funny. It’s a more accessible and jollier version of W. G. Sebald, minus the photos. There are quite a few funny lines by both Flaubert and Barnes.
This postmodern novel is short and hard to summarize. See here: https://tinyurl.com/yhp9bdjv. The narrator, Geoffrey Braithwaite, is a retired English physician and amateur Flaubert scholar. The story starts and ends with the narrator obsessing over which of the two stuffed parrots he has seen is the one Flaubert kept next to his desk while he wrote A Simple Heart. Chapter 14 is a mock short-essay test on the contents of the book.
Barnes left me wanting to read more Flaubert, including his correspondence. I’ve downloaded a copy of Sentimental Education from archive.org to have it to hand.
I showed this line to Tena. She laughed and said, “Hah! That’s you!” 😊
This is yet another from David Bowie’s list of favorite books. Having read a number of these, I’ve loved some and loathed others. This one is delightfully quirky, erudite, and funny. It’s a more accessible and jollier version of W. G. Sebald, minus the photos. There are quite a few funny lines by both Flaubert and Barnes.
This postmodern novel is short and hard to summarize. See here: https://tinyurl.com/yhp9bdjv. The narrator, Geoffrey Braithwaite, is a retired English physician and amateur Flaubert scholar. The story starts and ends with the narrator obsessing over which of the two stuffed parrots he has seen is the one Flaubert kept next to his desk while he wrote A Simple Heart. Chapter 14 is a mock short-essay test on the contents of the book.
Barnes left me wanting to read more Flaubert, including his correspondence. I’ve downloaded a copy of Sentimental Education from archive.org to have it to hand.
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