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Summary: Irving's Best
Review: And my favorite book of all time. It was my first exposure to one of America's great writers. When I first read this book 25 years ago it KNOCKED ME OUT. I had never read anything that was so funny, sad and true to life. It took me on the most amazing of journeys. The story is complex, the characters well drawn and the prose is exquisite. The novel is a multi-layered work of genuis.
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Summary: One of the best books I have ever read...
Review: This book is wonderful. It has unforgetable charaters, humor and depth. Even after 600 pages, I was still very sad to see it end. I have read a few of Irving's books, but this one will always be my favorite. There are some graphic imagry in there, but it really adds to story. Garp is a wonderful storyteller, with a bizar life. Read this book. You will love it.
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Summary: Just in case you forgot how crazy life is ...
Review: ... there's The World According to Garp to remind you. This book--which is at times hilarious, absurd, heart-breaking, outrageous, and tender ... often all of them at once--is one of the most profound books I've read in a while. As Garp described one of his own books, The World According to Garp is at once funny and serious, and above all it is "true." Irving often steps out of the bounds of what would normally be called common, or at least literary, decency, but the result is to remind us that the world we are living in is really an "X-rated soap opera," just like Garp's, full of comedy and tragedy, love and loss."To be full of Garp is to be full of life!" writes one reviewer, and I could not agree more. The World According to Garp was one of those books I wished would never end, but at the same time I was content with how it ended. Well before the end of this book, Garp and his family felt like a part of my own. If you have not read this book, what are you waiting for? Go out and read it! If you have read this book, count yourself fortunate: The World According to Garp is one of the most imaginative and enjoyable books out there.
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Summary: Mr. Irving does it again..............
Review: "The World According to Garp" is yet another wild, riveting story by a man with a shimmering imagination...Mr. John Irving. I am almost led to believe that the characters in the novel are not imagined people, they are far too real, too alive, each and every one of them. They touch your heart, they leave you thinking. The second half of the book, especially, is profound....the car accident that takes place and the ensuing trauma are described with such precision and such power that the reader is left drained...from the sorrow, the shock and the madness of it all. Garp's life is a story steeped in pathos yet this is not just another tragic novel. This is also a lesson about life, and the myriad "themes" that Irving presents through the book are very important; gender, marrriage, infidelity, parenthood, feminism, death, and the craft of writing, amidst other things. You must read this book. It's vintage Irving!
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Summary: The world according to a lot of people
Review: "The world according to Garp" is the story of the life of a common person, that could be any one of us mortal people. TS Garp's life, though, is an original one. Since his unusual conception, to his sudden death, we get to know who he was, and who were the people that were part of his life. John Irving is very good in developing unusual characters, like Garp's mother, a nurse turned into a beacon of feminism through her autobiography; or Roberta Muldoon, an ex-football player who became a transexual. Garp's life is full of accidents and neurosis, though he claims he wants to live an usual kind of life. In fact, this book is a little of neurotic itself, to be read in a fast pace though the events in it seem quite slow and consecutive; but when you stop a little, you have to think about just what happened. I don't know if it's intentional, but Irving describes Garp in a way that he could be one of his disturbed characters (Garp is a writer). Some of the best parts in the book is when Irving writes using Garp's hands; there are entire chapters "written" by Garp, filled with his stories, and it's very difficult for an author to change his style of writing in the middle of a work, something John Irving does quite naturaly. In all, a beautiful and interesting book. Grade 8.9/10
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Summary: best book ever
Review: I think this book is really great. Maybe the best book I have ever read. It takes up lust in a great way and it's just a funny and tragic story. I think everone will love this book. Read it!
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Summary: Just....good
Review: Beautiful novel. I loved this book. It's a comedy-tragedy about love and loss that manages to be funny without being cruel, and heartbreaking without being sentimental. All of the characters are very well fleshed out, and are extremely interesting. The relationships, while outrageous,are believable, and though the plot is out there, the book always keeps its feet on the ground. I really can't recommend it enough. What I will say, though, is this: Do NOT see the atrocious movie first. It is nothing at all like the book and it gets the characters personalities all wrong. Wait until you are in a weird mood and then pick up this delightfully fun and odd novel.
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Summary: Black Comedy Shines Bright
Review: This a dark, dark novel about the lunacy of the modern world. Those who appreciate gallows humor will find this book - though extremely tragic - the funniest they've read in a long time. "The World According to Garp" works precisely because it possesses a distinctly un-American prospective of reality, that is that not everything ends happily, not all promise is fulfilled, and there are not an unlimited number of chances in life. If you need an uplifting novel, don't bother with this one; similarly, stay away if you need a mental escape. But if you can handle reality, in all it's ghastly manifestations, pick up this book and laugh at it all.
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Summary: One strange book.........
Review: I read this book because my father said it was a good read, but i found it to be very strange. All the events that go on at the beging of the book involving Jenny Fields' are a little boring, but extremely essential to the plot of the story. After the beging of the story, when you find out how garp got the name TS Garp, it goes into the details about Garp in his school years and up through college, and after words. It also goes into details about Graps encounters with feminists, the Ellen-Jamisians, Roberta, and many other unusual charcters. I suggest this book for anyone looking for something a little out of the norm.
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Summary: Classic Irving
Review: Alot of the time when I read a book that I really like, I come on here and read the 1-star reviews of it, hoping, in most cases, that there won't be any. I was truly surprised to read some of the 1-star reviews on this book. Some said that this book wasn't as good as John Irving's other works such as "A Prayer for Owen Meany". Well, while I agree that "Owen" is truly a masterpiece, and it is better than "Garp", it doesn't surpass its older brother by much. "Garp" is just as involved and just as endearing. The characters are so real because Irving understands the trick to creating interesting characters: you must understand that nobody is normal! Everybody has something in their life that is utterly bizarre. If we all lived in suburban households with 2 parents, 2.5 kids, and nothing to worry about, things would be boring. So it makes sense to have bizarre characters like an udwed mother who impregnates herself with an unresponsive patient, or a linebacker for the Eagles who had a sex change. Another review of this book called it depressing, and I have to disagree completely. While Irving's novels often have sad endings, they aren't depressing. Although his characters often die, they are such good-natured and strong-willed characters, that their memories live on in the hearts of their loved ones and, therefore, in the hearts of their readers. The characters in an Irving novel only die in the physical sense. I highly reccomend this book. It is absolutely amazing in that it takes the life of a seemingly ordinary man and turns it into an epic. Even twenty years after it's publishing, it is still an excellent piece of fiction.
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