A very wicked book about a very wicked man, 26 Oct 2008
The Ginger Man is a thoroughly wonderful, riotously funny, head-shakingly brilliant read. I loved it from the very first line to the last.
First published in Paris in 1955, the book was banned in Ireland -- where it is set -- and the USA for obscenity. More than 50 years on, the story is still crude and ribald but certainly not as offensive as it must have seemed in more temperate times in places verging on puritan.
The story follows the adventures of Sebastian Dangerfield, an American Protestant of Irish descent, who is studying law at Trinity College just after the Second World War. Married to an English woman and with an infant daughter, Dangerfield is a chancer who shies away from any form of responsibility, preferring to hang out with his friend, fellow student Kenneth O'Keefe, rather than do any proactive study.
Obsessed with booze and women, he does everything a married man should not do: spends the couple's rent money on alcohol, staggers home drunk and acts violently towards his wife. He also has numerous adulterous affairs in which he treats the women abominably. He is, in short, a thoroughly unlikable and selfish cad. And yet, in Donleavy's hands, Dangerfield is a character you love to hate. I spent most of the time thinking this can't be true, he can't get away with this, surely the man has a conscience? And kept turning the pages, hoping to discover that the man would mend his wicked ways if only he realised his behaviour was so outrageously appalling.
The book is written in a weird mish-mash of viewpoints, effortlessly switching between first person and third person.
There are some scenes that are laugh-out-loud funny; others so shockingly brutal you're not sure you want to read on. I found myself not knowing whether I should be grimacing or chortling throughout. But it's this very fine line between comedy and tragedy that makes The Ginger Man work -- on so many different levels. The beauty of this rather marvellous novel is that it paints a very human portrait of a man so desperately troubled -- financially, emotionally, mentally -- that it's hard not to empathise with him just a little.
Brilliant, 12 Oct 2006
I became aware of this book after recently reading a Hunter S. Thompson biography, wherein it describes how Hunter discovered the book in New York, and did his best to imitate Dangerfield's lifestyle. After reading the Ginger Man it became apparent that Hunter had at last found a hard act to follow in terms of womanising, alcohol abuse and empty promises.
Apparently the Ginger Man was turned down by something like 40 publishers before finding it's way to the mainly pornographic publishers Olympia Press in Paris. Despite turning out mostly smut, Olympia owner Maurice Girodias also published some early works by the likes of Samuel Beckett, William Burroughs, Henry Miller and Jean Genet amongst other rising literary talents of the time.
I mention the publication as it's interesting to note that Donleavy entered into 20 plus years of litigation with the publishing house. He eventually won the case and subsequently owns Olympia Press.
But anyway, the book. It is, for better or worse, very real. The "hero" Sebastian Dangerfield is a reluctant family man and a reluctant student of law. He just doesn't care about the things which we assume he should care about. He is constantly in a state of scheming his way into the next free drink, or getting into the knickers of an easily led girl. He has no morals, nor does he feel that he should have. He is banking on an inherited wealth which will be his once his sick father dies.
The style of the book is modern for the time of it's writing. Donleavy uses both the first person narrative and the third person narrative to illustrate his main character. This can be confusing at first, but I found that after a few chapters, it adds to the urgency/pace (first person) and the backgrounds (third person) as he switches between the two different types of narration. This could not be achieved by sticking to either one of the disciplines.
The plot is quite simple, as a character novel should be. The backdrop is Dublin and then later London. Both are described well.
The dialogue is at times simply brilliant. One of the few books where you find yourself laughing aloud, and re-reading passages in an attempt to recall lines and slip them into a conversation at some point in the future. It is so easy to see why this book has since been turned into a stage production. I would imagine that the theater would be in fits of giggles.
I would recommend this book to anyone who is interested in the development of modern literature. And for that matter anyone with an open mind and a good sense of humour. It is in many ways one of the best novels of the 20th century.
A Great Modernist Novel, 04 May 2006
J.P Donleavy did a great job in writing a novel in the modernist fashion. He not only captured the ideals of a modernist in rejecting the norms of society, but he also did it using humor. Although the humor could be very vulgar and distasteful, it was used in a way to get across the personality of Sebastian and his rebellion to society and their "way of living". (I did however find myself giggling at the circumstances he found himself in.)
Donleavy followed in the footsteps of James Joyce and attempted to use "stream of consciousness" in his novel "The Gingerman". This new, modernist form of writing showed the real thoughts of a person and how these thoughts bring about other thoughts in succession. I found that he did a VERY good job in using this method, and although Dangerfield was not a character of high moral, he was an interesting character and the type of character that a modernist uses in order to get his point across. Yes, Dangerfield DID spend his time being cruel to women, breaking promises, and acting like a childish alcoholic; however, this character was shocking and had REAL thoughts and was the PERFECT character to portray a modernist view.
This book was also very interesting in the fact that this was how J.P. Donleavy really lived his own life and he was much like the character, making this novel a fictional autobiographical peice.
I guess the point I am trying to get across is that I have a lot of respect for this novel despite the actions of the character. I have studied this novel in a modernism class and the ideals of a modernist are VERY interesting once you get to know them. I think that if "A reader from Dublin, Ireland" were to study the views of a modernist writer, she would have found this book to be a lot more interesting. I enjoyed it, and I would recommend this book.
Sebastian is not your typical family guy, if you know what I mean, 03 May 2006
In response to the only person who gave this magnificent book a bad review... You seem to have no sense of humor. This book was very well written, and I was interested all the way through it. It was written in a style reminiscent of James Joyce, while still retaining a unique voice. I would consider this novel to be a modernist text, as the story isn't quite linear, and the whole tale is told through the filter of Sebastian Dangerfield's mind. Using this distances the reader away from the unlikable Dangerfield, but that distance causes the reader to identify with him in someway, making him likable. After reading the book, and contemplation about why I liked it so much, I realized that it slightly reminded me of the animated television series "The Family Guy". The non-linear parts that are more like memories, and the crudeness and ridiculousness of the humor are quiet similar. I hope that doesn't stop anyone who dislikes the show from reading this novel. Once you do read you will recognize how I made the comparison to "The Family Guy". Great Read!!!
The Dark Side, 30 Apr 2006
Sebastian Dangerfield is in no way purported to be a model human being. Donleavy puts all of Sebastian's flaws out in the open: Sebastian is a vulgar, abusive, and irresponsible alcoholic. Sebastian is in no way the gallant, classic, and Victorian hero of the past. He is instead the rejection of all that was pure and virginal in previous works of literature. He is the product of Modernism.
Modernism as part of its very foundation sought to shock people. I think of Sebastian Dangerfield as a literary equivalent of the shock-rocker Marilyn Manson. Will reading how Sebastian hits his wife make readers hit their spouse? Will listening to Marilyn Manson turn people into gothic murderers? Everyone has their own opinion as answer to those questions but it seems obvious to me that readers (and music listeners) need to realize that human beings are not the sugar coated ladies and gentlemen of yore. People do some terrible things. Everyone has a dark side, no matter how slight. I was not at all offended by The Ginger Man. Perhaps it was the fact that I was introduced to the text in the anything-goes Modernist context, perhaps I am a little too liberal. I will always find this book uproariously funny though. I can always side with a character that can make commentary on the human condition without doting clichés. I can at once laugh at Sebastian and be amused by him, without being "on his side" - his very dark side.
A short book that feels like a long one, 02 Aug 2008
Never having read J.P. Donleavy before, I needed something short and entertaining to read on a quick plane journey so I got this. I was interested to find out why the guy is so famous. I am still none the wiser. I am not easily defeated by a book, but the thing about comic novels is that they're supposed to be funny; this was just 'humorous', in that I could tell that Mr. Donleavy found the whole thing ever so rib-ticklingly amusing but he had not managed to communicate the point of it all to a mere reader like myself. A pointless fable about a woman with a supposedly-hilariously-long name, it has no apparent connection with reality; I dunno where Donleavy is getting this stuff from. The writing is incredibly stale and shoddy. The author seems to have a tin ear, with no sense of how to punctuate a sentence for comic effect, and the general impression is that it was written by someone trying to deal with a bad hangover. If you compare Donleavy's heavy jocularity to genuinely gifted comic writers like PG Wodehouse or even Douglas Adams, they are figure skaters and he's a brontosaurus.
I ended up not being able to finish it; even the inflight magazine was more fun. I regretted wasting my money on an apparent vanity project by an obviously burned-out writer. I am still mildly curious to see why he got to be famous in the first place, but not very much so.
Brilliantly bizarre and frighteningly funny, 09 Nov 2001
This is an absolutely thrilling journey around Donleavy's rampant imagination. One woman's lifestory which is enough in itself but there is a constant quest to find (and use) only clean restrooms. And where that leads her? Read the book and see. I could not put this book down, laughed until I cried and the ending - absolutely totally unexpected. I cannot reccomend this book highly enough. Buy it now!
brilliant - but short!, 25 Mar 2001
J.P. still writes near his his best despite... (well how old is he, anyway!)
Certainly the pithiest Donleavy, I think, and that's saying something. Short and sweet - a brilliant one-night read. Leaves one less suicidal than some of his earlier work, however, which might disappoint some.
