A Fan's Notes: A Fictional Memoir - Softcover

Frederick Exley

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0140030573 ISBN 13: 9780140030570

Publisher: Penguin, 1970

Synopsis

Christmas nverting fact into fiction and fantasy into fact, Exley - part Ulysses, part Orpheus - battles through the American nightmare in his efforts to defeat the American dream of intellectual conformity and material success. A staggering original new talent.

About this title

Review

Frederick Exley recounts his life as the son of a hero-worshipped high school athlete who is doomed to be a spectator not only of sports, but of life. From irresponsible drifter, to dreamer of impossible dreams, to drunkard, to frequent patient at an asylum, Exley carried baggage from his childhood through much of his adult life, never feeling he could escape the dark cloud of expectation that hung over him. When Frank Gifford, former New York Giants backfield star, is injured, Exley is jolted into painful realisations about his life and a confession.

Review

"A Fan's Notes is one man's life written with brilliance and insight. No one should have had Exley's life, and no one who has read it can forget it" (James Dickey)

"Writers of every kind of aesthetic and cultural persuasion talk about it and press it on their friends. When I urge it on a friend who asks what it is about or what it is like, I say read it, just read it" (Geoffrey Wolff)

"Astonishing... It is visceral and intimate. Self-absorbed, it is also searingly perceptive about what happens between fathers and sons, men and women" (Independent)

Edition details

• Publisher: Penguin
• Publication date: 1970
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0140030573
• ISBN 13: 9780140030570
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 352