A Son of the Circus - Softcover

Irving, John

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0345398203 ISBN 13: 9780345398208

Publisher: Knopf Canada, 1995

Synopsis

"A SON OF THE CIRCUS IS COMIC GENIUS....GET READY FOR IRVING'S MOST RAUCOUS NOVEL TO DATE."
--The Boston Globe
"Dr. Farrokh Daruwalla, reared in Bombay by maverick foes of tradition, educated in Vienna, married to an Austrian and long a resident of Toronto, is a 59-year-old without a country, culture or religion to call his own....The novel may not be 'about' India, but Irving's imagined India, which Daruwalla visits periodically, is a remarkable achievement--a pandemonium of servants and clubmen, dwarf clowns and transvestite whores, missionaries and movie stars. This is a land of energetic colliding egos, of modern media clashing with ancient cultures, of broken sexual boundaries."
--New York Newsday
"HIS MOST DARING AND MOST VIBRANT NOVEL...The story of circus-as-India is told with gusto and delightful irreverence."
--Bharati Mukherjee
The Washington Post Book World
"Ringmaster Irving introduces act after act, until three (or more) rings are awhirl at a lunatic pace....[He] spills characters from his imagination as agilely as improbable numbers of clowns pile out of a tiny car....His Bombay and his Indian characters are vibrant and convincing."
--The Wall Street Journal
"IRRESISTIBLE...POWERFUL...Irving's gift for dialogue shines."
--Chicago Tribune

About this title

Review

"Daruwalla is another iconic Irving figure... Irving handles this incarnadine combination of farce and horror with high speed skill, creating a compulsively readable book" (Guardian)

"[Irving] is at the peak of his powers... he plunges the reader into one sensual or grotesque scene after another with cheerful vigour and a madcap tenderness for life... entertainment on a grand scale" (Economist)

"More plot twists than the Ramayana and a cast of characters that includes dwarves, prostitutes, movie stars, tranvestites and at least one serial killer" (Daily Telegraph)

"Irving has given us that treat of treats, a wide-ranging fiction of massive design and length that encapsulates our world with intelligence and sugars the pill with wit" (Mail on Sunday)

"Daruwalla's quest for the truth is what sustains this book... a writer with the courage to follow this difficult journey while also exploring issues of poverty, racism and disease in a novel so full of humour is a writer to be treasured" (The Times)

Book Description

A masterpiece from one of the great contemporary American writers.

Edition details

• Publisher: Knopf Canada
• Publication date: 1995
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0345398203
• ISBN 13: 9780345398208
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback