Rating: 
Summary: One of my all time favorites.
Review: If you do not appreciate the complexity of Toole's world view, you shall feel the sting of the lash accross your pitiful shoulders!
Rating:
Summary: The sweaty armpit of life
Review: I really liked this book. It was hilarious. Everybody in the book is a lunatic in one way or another from Jones who likes to wear sunglasses inside a dimly lit bar at night to the main character Ignatius Reilly, whose method of eating jelly donuts made me squirm (sucking the jelly out and throwing the rest of it back in the box). I don't give this a ten simply because it gave me an uneasy feeling sometimes in the pit of my stomach. Its like I stuck my finger in some muck. From a literary standpoint I do give this a ten.
Rating:
Summary: The Title Speaks to Those Who Don't Get It!
Review: After reading "Confederacy" for the second time (and consider it one of my favorite books), and having only briefly perused the comments listed here...all I can say is that the title of the book says it all. If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the confederacy.
Rating:
Summary: Your dress can be theologically and geometrically incorrect!
Review: The book is best described by its title and a working knowledge of Boethius, the philosopher.
The word "dunce" is derived from John Duns Scotus, the celebrated scholastic theologian, called `Doctor Subtilis' the Subtle Doctor, who died in 1308. His works on theology, philosophy, and logic, were textbooks in the Universities, in which (as at Oxford) his followers, called Scotists, were a predominating Scholastic sect, until the 16th c., when the system was attacked with ridicule, first by the humanists, and then by the reformers, as a farrago of needless entities, and useless distinctions. The Dunsmen or Dunses, on their side, railed against the `new learning', and the name Duns or Dunce, already synonymous with `cavilling sophist' or `hair-splitter', soon passed into the sense of `dull obstinate person impervious to the new learning', and of `blockhead incapable of learning or scholarship'.
Boethius, is a 500 century Italian scholar, wrote texts on geometry and arithmetic which were of poor quality but used for many centuries during a time when mathematical achievement in Europe was at a remarkable low.
Reilly, the obese, farting, belching central character believes that Boethius together with the cartoon character batman, uphold all that is worthwhile in philosophy! His worldview is ludicruously insane, his actions that of a madman. During his graduate years, he advised one of his professors, to hang himself by his underdeveloped testicles. His girlfriend, thinks that the problems of the world can be solved only through liberated sex. The thoughts and actions of all the characters in the story seem like some sort of a tribal incantation. Yet, the foreknowledge of events, the delight in repetition gives strength to storytelling. The overall conglomeration is precisely - a confederacy of dunces. In parts the book is funny, but together the book shows us how easy it is to get trapped in our respective small worlds.
Rating:
Summary: You're a sad human being if you did NOT like this book.
Review: Given some of the comments made previously regarding Ignatius Riley's "sad" existence, I must say that those finding him to be such a sad character are, themselves, sad. What limited and reprehensible strain of thought do you people come from. This is arguably the best book written in the 20th century.
Rating:
Summary: Something wrong with your sense of humor if you don't like
Review: I read this many years ago (late 70's? early 80's?) when it first hit paperback. I have been recommending it to people ever since. A friend of mine once read it on a long airplane flight. He said people were looking at him like he was deranged, he was laughing out loud so often. Ignatius' letter to the firm he lambasts so ridiculously still gets me weeping with laughter. I once actually had a friend of a friend tell me that she couldn't detect the humor. From that point on, I felt like there was something definitely wrong with her. Buy this now.
Rating: 
Summary: Funny first, and tragically, only effort
Review: To bad John Kennedy Toole died before publishing. His mother had to convince the publisher to read the manuscript upon finding it after his death. A great read, I always wondered if it was somewhat autobiographical considering he never attempted to have it published himself.
Rating:
Summary: Loved it!
Review: I didnt't give this book a ten because I'm holding out for that one spectacular book. I'll know it when I read it. Anyway, this book is one that you simply must read several times in order to get all the humor. Some you don't catch the first time around. I highly recommend it for vacations or plane trips. It may be tough at first, but I promise you that it's worth it. Enjoy!
Rating: 
Summary: Just a sad tale of an equally sad boob!
Review: I had a hard time getting through this book, but I read it. Did not see the humor in making fun of such a sad character.
Rating:
Summary: This is rather fine.
Review: I don't give out tens for any but the best. This is my favorite novel. Toole is not a polished or fully mature author; the writing is uneven, and some scenes drag, especially those involving Levy and his cliched harridan of a wife. That said, I will add my voice to the cacophany of delirious fans. Brilliant, the work of a visionary. A seething, poignant book that captures the tragedy as well as the comedy of urban life. If there was some voudou ritual that would bring Toole back for the sequel I'd volunteer myself as a sacrifice. Scintillating dialects and dialogues, a dozen determinedly interwoven subplots, and of course Ignatius J Reilly himself, the hero whose (disappointingly trim) statue graces present-day Canal St. in New Orleans. This book is a nucular bum.
| 
