Slouching Towards Kalamazoo

Slouching Towards Kalamazoo PDF Author: Peter De Vries
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 022614920X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 251

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Book Description
The classic American coming of age novel of a precocious young man and the lessons learned from his tutor by “a masterly entertainer and social satirist” (The New York Times). It is 1963 in an unnamed town in North Dakota, and Anthony Thrasher is languishing for a second year in eighth grade. Prematurely sophisticated, young Anthony spends too much time reading Joyce, Eliot, and Dylan Thomas but not enough time studying the War of 1812 or obtuse triangles. A tutor is hired, and this "modern Hester Prynne" offers Anthony lessons that ultimately free him from eighth grade and situate her on the cusp of the American sexual revolution. In Slouching Towards Kalamazoo, Peter De Vries finds the perfect vehicle for his eridute wit in Anthony’s restless adolescent voice. Demonstrating a fascination with both language and female anatomy, Anthony’s pitch-perfect narration propels this satirical coming of age tale through theological debates and quandaries both dermatological and ethical, while soaring on the De Vriesian hallmark of scrambling conventional wisdom for comic effect.

Slouching Towards Kalamazoo

Slouching Towards Kalamazoo PDF Author: Peter De Vries
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 022614920X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 251

Get Book Here

Book Description
The classic American coming of age novel of a precocious young man and the lessons learned from his tutor by “a masterly entertainer and social satirist” (The New York Times). It is 1963 in an unnamed town in North Dakota, and Anthony Thrasher is languishing for a second year in eighth grade. Prematurely sophisticated, young Anthony spends too much time reading Joyce, Eliot, and Dylan Thomas but not enough time studying the War of 1812 or obtuse triangles. A tutor is hired, and this "modern Hester Prynne" offers Anthony lessons that ultimately free him from eighth grade and situate her on the cusp of the American sexual revolution. In Slouching Towards Kalamazoo, Peter De Vries finds the perfect vehicle for his eridute wit in Anthony’s restless adolescent voice. Demonstrating a fascination with both language and female anatomy, Anthony’s pitch-perfect narration propels this satirical coming of age tale through theological debates and quandaries both dermatological and ethical, while soaring on the De Vriesian hallmark of scrambling conventional wisdom for comic effect.

Slouching Towards Kalamazoo

Slouching Towards Kalamazoo PDF Author: Peter DeVries
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780147794680
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 241

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Book Description


Slouching Towards Kalamazoo

Slouching Towards Kalamazoo PDF Author: Outlet
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780517493885
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description


Reuben, Reuben

Reuben, Reuben PDF Author: Peter De Vries
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 022617056X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 446

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Book Description
"Reuben Reuben "is set in mid 1950s suburbia in Connecticut and starts out being told from the point of view of a grumpy but corruptible chicken farmer. The novel s second part recounts what happens when a womanizing poet from Wales (clearly Dylan Thomas) visits this new-to-him world of tidy lawns and cocktail parties and liberated lady poets. In the final third, a British poet/agent named Mopworth continues the story of the confused suburban literati. Fast-paced, devastating, energetic, and laugh-out-loud funny, it also has a manic note to it, as if the author were Scheherazade-like; being compulsively entertainingscrambling to amuse the reader with stories and jokes lest serious questions arise."

The Cat's Pajamas and Witch's Milk

The Cat's Pajamas and Witch's Milk PDF Author: Peter De Vries
Publisher: Open Road Media
ISBN: 1497669626
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 190

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Book Description
Twin tales of middle-class hilarity and despair from the writer who was dubbed “America’s preeminent comic novelist” by the New York Times When college professor Hank Tattersall sees his former flame, Lucy Stiles, at a campus concert, it sets off a chain reaction that results in one of the funniest and most unforgettable exit scenes in American literature—involving a locked door, an alcoholic dog, and a punning doppelgänger. The Cat’s Pajamas is the story of how Tattersall, a scrupulous self-reflector, falls from point A to point Z, rushing through a host of identities and indignities along the way. The unexamined life may not be worth living, he discovers, but the examined one is hardly a bed of roses. In Witch’s Milk, Tillie Seltzer has her own trials to attend to. Chief among them is her marriage to Pete, the kind of guy who tucks a cigarette behind his ear and calls everybody Frisbee. When they first met, Tillie had more sophisticated tastes—dark strangers, homburg hats—but she was also a thirtysomething virgin whose prospects weren’t getting any better. When she cracked a joke about the honeymoon being over, Pete believed her. Now stuck in suburbia with a sick child and a philandering husband, Tillie takes a hard look in the rearview mirror. Her search for an escape route will lead her to the most unexpected place of all. These short novels are linked by Tillie’s cameo appearance in Hank’s narrative and by the thrilling blend of satire, tragedy, and philosophy that defines the one-of-a-kind fiction of Peter De Vries.

A Craftsman's Legacy

A Craftsman's Legacy PDF Author: Eric Gorges
Publisher: Algonquin Books
ISBN: 1616209445
Category : Crafts & Hobbies
Languages : en
Pages : 256

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Book Description
The host of Public Television's A Craftsman’s Legacy makes the case that the craftsman’s way--the philosophy, the skills, and the mindset--can provide a blueprint for all of us in our increasingly hurried, disposable world. These days, in the name of technological progress, we have devalued and minimized the personal, the imperfect, and the handmade. We’ve become distant from the process of creating and shaping real things, which can even diminish our power to shape our own destinies. As a metal shaper, Eric Gorges has visited and learned from the fellow craftsmen he has profiled for his popular public television program. In this book he tells the stories and shares the collective wisdom of these modern-day makers while also celebrating the culture of all craftsmen. A Craftsman’s Legacy is filled with insights--about the physical, psychological, and spiritual aspects of craftsmanship--from calligraphers, bit and spur makers, potters, stone carvers, glassblowers, engravers, wood workers, and others. Gorges identifies shared values: take time to slow down and enjoy the process; embrace failure; know when to stop and when to push through; accept that perfection is an illusion. He extols the benefits of getting out of our comfort zone, the pleasure of making something lasting, and the importance of being in touch with the traditions of the past in order to carry those values into the future. Along the way, Gorges tells his own story about leaving the corporate world to focus on what he loves. This is a book for makers, for seekers of all kinds, an exhilarating look into the heart and soul of craftsmen--and how they can inspire us all.

Let Me Count the Ways

Let Me Count the Ways PDF Author: Peter De Vries
Publisher: Open Road Media
ISBN: 149766960X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 221

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Book Description
The sins of the father are hilariously visited on the son in this witty and profound novel about the meaning of it all Stanley Waltz is a Polish American piano mover and pugnacious atheist married to a born-again believer. His heroes are H. L. Mencken and Clarence Darrow, and if he confuses “illusion” with “allusion” and thinks a certain style of egg is “bedeviled,” that does not mean his reasoning is any less sound. Unfortunately, his wife is immune to his intellect and insists not just on saving his soul but on taking their son, Tom, to the local gospel mission every chance she gets. It is enough to drive a man into the arms of a mistress “funny as a crutch and twice as perceptive”—and that is exactly where Stan goes. This leaves Tom twice as mixed up as the average son. In the second section of this side-splitting and thought-provoking comedy, he is a professor of English at the local college, his questions about faith, doubt, and morality as unresolved as they are inescapable. As an undergraduate, he stumbled from girl to girl, breaking up with one because she was a nonbeliever, another because she was too pious. His marriage to a beautiful professor of comparative religion is no solution. In short order, he has an affair, breaks his leg, leads a funeral procession hopelessly astray, and suffers a nervous breakdown. Only a miracle can save him—if he can figure out what one might look like. Stanley and Tom Waltz are a father-son duo unlike any other, and Let Me Count the Ways is Peter De Vries at his insightful, brilliant, lightning-witted best.

The Tunnel of Love

The Tunnel of Love PDF Author: Peter De Vries
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 022617347X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 257

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Book Description
"The Tunnel of Love "is a goofy situation comedy involving suburban neighbors who know too much about each other s private lives. The narrator is an upstanding commuting family man who, faced with awkward situations, plays sick, has small fits of rage, or babbles something inappropriate and/or witty. Like the author, he works on cartoons published in a New York magazine, and uses humor to deal with stress. The plot includes an officious lady employed by an adoption agency, and the confused identities of babies. A pointed satire of suburban life, it is also a retro, lively romp, and more cheerful than some of the De Vries s later novels set in this world. "

Short Stories

Short Stories PDF Author: Irwin Shaw
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 9780226751283
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 786

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Book Description
Featuring sixty-three stories spanning five decades, this superb collection-including "Girls in Their Summer Dresses," "Sailor Off the Bremen," and "The Eighty-Yard Run"-clearly illustrates why Shaw is considered one of America's finest short-story writers.

God of War II

God of War II PDF Author: Robert E. Vardeman
Publisher: Del Rey
ISBN: 0345524756
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 370

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Book Description
All the majesty and mayhem of Greek mythology springs to life once more in the powerful second novel based on the bestselling and critically acclaimed God of War® franchise. Once the mighty warrior Kratos was a slave to the gods, bound to do their savage bidding. After destroying Ares, the God of War, Kratos was granted his freedom by Zeus—and even given the ousted god’s throne on Olympus. But the other gods of the pantheon didn’t take kindly to Kratos’s ascension and, in turn, conspired against him. Banished, Kratos must ally himself with the despised Titans, ancient enemies of the Olympians, in order to take revenge and silence the nightmares that haunt him. God of War II takes the videogame’s action to electrifying new heights, and adds ever more fascinating layers to the larger-than-life tale of Kratos.