A Confederacy of Dunces

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Summary: So maybe education isn't all it's cracked up to be...
Review: ...after all, as Ignatious Reilly proves in A Confederacy of Dunces, 10 years of college, a vocabulary that won't quit, and a roomful of Big Chief tablets filled with political treatises doesn't mean you're smart. In Ignatious's case, it just means he's really cynical. And hateful. If this book weren't so damn funny, it would be awfully hard to spend 300+ pages with Ignatious Reilly. One of the most spoiled, self-centered, lazy, and lunatic characters you'll ever meet, Ignatious has an audacity--like a Don Rickles insult--that makes you laugh in spite of whatever good manners you thought you had. Surrounded by a cast of supporting characters, who are equally as repulsive in their own way, Ignatious takes you on a journey through the absurd. By the time it's over, though, you have to admit that you wouldn't mind spending some more time on this road.

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Summary: A rare blend of hillarious comedy and social insight
Review: I'm more amazed by the book with each new time I read it. Toole has captured the city of New Orleans and its subcultures like no one I've ever seen. This results in some of the funniest reading I've ever seen, being very thought-provoking at the same time. I don't think you can go wrong reading this book

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Summary: Where's the humor?
Review: I kept waitin for this book to become funny, interesting or even mildly amusing. I realized that it was a story written for people with very undeveloped funny bones. It was a chore reading this book even though I was on a six hour train ride

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Summary: A Masterpiece of Laughter
Review: In a lifetime of reading, there is no book I have ever read that has made me laugh out loud more than this book. I have now read it at least 4 times, and each time I not only laugh at the parts which set me off in earlier readings, but I find new sections which bring new smiles, grins and outright belly laughs. Why is there no movie of this book? Is it because John Belushi is dead

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Summary: Unforgettable
Review: Ignatius Reilly, the obese and borrish man arounf whom A Confederacy of Dunces revolves, is a truly unforgettable character in fiction...as unforgettable as anything Shakespeare or Dickens came up with. His flowery language and condescending nature are so outlandish and hilarious that I actually was sad to finish the book. He is so real by the end of the book that you expect to meet him when you go to New Orleans. Truly a classic

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Summary: A pedantic, impudent buffoon gracefully avoids reality
Review: Most novels follow a story line whose main purpose is simply to reach the end of the book. Rarely, novels come along where the reading of each and every line is a momentous climax unto itself. Every word of A Confederacy Of Dunces counts. There is no filler. There are no lulls in the hilarity and outrageous buffooneries of one Ignatius J. Reilly. Slow, Fat, Awkward, Flatulent, Gastric, Impudent, Boastful. Single words alone don't even begin to describe what can only be understood by experiencing him in his magnificent splendor, as he crusades for causes unknown and victimless injustices. He is at times as simple and uncomplicated as the Big Chief tablets upon which he inscribes his numerous diatribes against the modern world of nearly four hundred years before him. At others, he creates amazingly complex schemes geared expressly toward the purpose of avoiding gainful employment. He is an anti-hero whom we can't help but love and despise in the same instant, surrounded by a cast of equally engrossing simpletons as they try to unsuccessfully reason his motives and actions. A Confederacy Of Dunces is a classic of literature and certainly the funniest book you will ever read

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Summary: I laughed out loud until it hurt!
Review: The funniest book I have ever read. It says a lot about a book when you can be reading it alone and laugh so hard your side hurts. A wonderful book

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Summary: Perhaps the funniest book in the English Language today
Review: A more whimical look at New Orleans and its mix of people has never been written. The early passing of John Kennedy Toole [age 23] is all the more heart wrenching when you read this beatifully crafted work

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Summary: A Boy and His World View
Review: Think *you've* got problems? Check out the world of Ignatius J. Reilly, a thunderously large man who lives with a mother who bowls for her arthritis, loves/hates Doris Day movies, and thinks Western civilation went down the toilet after the Dark Ages. Due to circumstances he denies he's in control of, Ignatius is forced to find a job in that Brooklyn-by-the-Gulf, New Orleans. Toole does the impossible by creating a sublimely comic universe filled with characters impossible to forget. A truly unique work

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Summary: How Did He Do It?
Review: I have read this book three or four times now, and I remain stunned by Toole's unbelievable grasp of how funny social interaction can be when people are so different inside. He displays a tremendous intellect, yet it funnels through via spectacular comedy, at once disarming and enlightening the reader. We will all miss the insights he could have continued to provide us