Singular Pleasures (Paperback)
Language: English
Published by Dalkey Archive Press, Normal, IL, 2026
- Softcover
- New
Seller: Grand Eagle Retail, Bensenville, IL, U.S.A.Grand Eagle Retail
AbeBooks seller since October 12, 2005
Condition: New
£ 14.86
Quantity: 1 available
Add to basketItem description from seller
Paperback. A 'cool, humorous, and affectionate' book of vignettes about a practice that is universal and universally taboo: masturbation.In sixty-one vignettes, Harry Mathews records the imaginative varieties of this solitary activity in prose that is playful, intimate, and humane. The soloists range in age from nine to eighty; the locales from Australia to Zaire; the means from the commonplace to the bizarre. There is the young man in Gaza with his hair dryers, the woman in Manila with her cello bow, the long-eared bat, the charioteer, the candelabra.'There is nothing pornographic, in the strict sense, about Mathews' text, since it does not seek to arouse the reader', wrote John Ash for Artforum. 'His intention is to leave us deeply impressed by the ingenuity, tenacity, and inventiveness with which humans in all places and at all ages have pursued their own pleasure. He succeeds completely.' The text is illustrated throughout with watercolours by Francesco Clemente that offer an intriguing counterpoint to Mathews's fictions. 'Some of the vignettes are silly, some exotic, some satiric, some erotic, most poetic, some neutral, and some.touchingly lovely.' Kirkus'Gives a new meaning to "reading for pleasure."' Cups Shipping may be from multiple locations in the US or from the UK, depending on stock availability.…
Seller Inventory # 9781628976472
- Title
- Singular Pleasures (Paperback)
- Author
- Harry Mathews
- Publisher
- Dalkey Archive Press, Normal, IL
- Publication year
- 2026
- Condition
- new
- Binding
- Paperback
- Language
- English
- ISBN 10
- 1628976470
- ISBN 13
- 9781628976472
- Illustrator
- Clemente, Francesco
A “cool, humorous, and affectionate” book of vignettes about a practice that is universal and universally taboo: masturbation.
In sixty-one vignettes, Harry Mathews records the imaginative varieties of this solitary activity in prose that is playful, intimate, and humane. The soloists range in age from nine to eighty; the locales from Australia to Zaire; the means from the commonplace to the bizarre. There is the young man in Gaza with his hair dryers, the woman in Manila with her cello bow, the long-eared bat, the charioteer, the candelabra...
“There is nothing pornographic, in the strict sense, about Mathews' text, since it does not seek to arouse the reader,” wrote John Ash for Artforum. “His intention is to leave us deeply impressed by the ingenuity, tenacity, and inventiveness with which humans in all places and at all ages have pursued their own pleasure. He succeeds completely.” The text is illustrated throughout with watercolors by Francesco Clemente that offer an intriguing counterpoint to Mathews's fictions.
"Synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.
About the Author
Harry Mathews was born in New York City in 1930 and spent his adult life in the United States and in France, where he co-founded the influential journal Locus Solus with John Ashbery, Kenneth Koch, and James Schuyler in 1961. He was the first American member of the literary consortium Oulipo, alongside Raymond Queneau, Italo Calvino, and Georges Perec. His many writings, spanning novels, short fiction, poems, essays, and translations from the French, include The Conversions, Tlooth, The Sinking of the Odradek Stadium, Cigarettes, The Journalist, My Life in CIA, and The Solitary Twin. Mathews was honored by the French government as an Officer of the Order of Arts and Letters and earned awards from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the National Endowment for the Arts. He died in Key West, Florida, in 2017.
"About the title" may belong to another edition of this title.
Grand Eagle Retail
Bensenville, IL, U.S.A.
AbeBooks seller since October 12, 2005
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