The World According to Garp

Rating:
Summary: Irving's Near-Autobiography
Review: In 1976, John Irving published what would seem to many an almost autobiographical novel. In “The World According to Garp”, Irving introduced a character that seemed to closely follow Irving’s own path through life. The story of T.S. Garp seemed almost to be the story of John Irving, with a few twists and turns thrown in. It is possible that Irving romanticized his own life and came up with the life of Garp. T.S. Garp was the [illegitemate] child of Jenny Fields, the daughter of a wealthy family of shoemakers and Technical Sergeant Garp, who was injured during World War II. Technical Sergeant Garp had received extensive brain damage during an attack, and this made him slowly revert to a child. Jenny Fields, who wanted to have a baby, but didn’t want to be married or attached to a man in any way to do so, impregnated herself with the nearly catatonic Sergeant Garp. It is never revealed to anybody, even Jenny Fields herself what the first name of Sergeant Garp is. In his honor, she named her son T.S. Garp The novel focuses on young T.S. Garp’s development as a writer and as a wrestler, two things that happened to be very close to John Irving’s own heart, since he was a wrestling coach at Vermont Academy and he, obviously, was a novelist. Garp, in his formative years is regarded with distrust and unease. He and his mother are spoken about behind his back, but he doesn’t understand the insults. Garp and his mother lived at the Steering School, an all boys boarding school. His mother worked as a nurse the entire time they were there. Through his time there, Garp would develop his love for writing, which he would always be proficient in, and he developed a love for wrestling. Garp at first didn’t know much about sports, except that he didn’t like many of them, was signed up for wrestling by his mother. Garp would befriend the coach, Ernie Holm and his daughter, Helen, who read as much as she could in the wrestling room. Garp, as he went through school, fell in love with Helen Holm. He began to write to her, short stories that he believed would win her over. He continued to write to her as much as possible, even when she began attending a different boarding school that was far away. She would critique his work and tell him how she felt. She would be his first audience, and her avid reading would always pose a challenge to him, forcing him to give her things to read. ... I would recommend this book to anyone looking for a serious look into the deeply emotional and entirely human world of writing. This book provides a look into the human psyche, and tells of a person among us, not of something removed from our lives, but that of someone who lives on our block and comes to our parties. This is the world according to John Irving; life is complicated, but we all chose how seriously we take it. We all lead a life according to ourselves and we have to accept responsibility for it.

Rating:
Summary: Irving's Near-Autobiography
Review: In 1976, John Irving published what would seem to many an almost autobiographical novel. In "The World According to Garp", Irving introduced a character that seemed to closely follow Irving's own path through life. The story of T.S. Garp seemed almost to be the story of John Irving, with a few twists and turns thrown in. It is possible that Irving romanticized his own life and came up with the life of Garp. T.S. Garp was the bastard child of Jenny Fields, the daughter of a wealthy family of shoemakers and Technical Sergeant Garp, who was injured during World War II. Technical Sergeant Garp had received extensive brain damage during an attack, and this made him slowly revert to a child. Jenny Fields, who wanted to have a baby, but didn't want to be married or attached to a man in any way to do so, impregnated herself with the nearly catatonic Sergeant Garp. It is never revealed to anybody, even Jenny Fields herself what the first name of Sergeant Garp is. In his honor, she named her son T.S. Garp The novel focuses on young T.S. Garp's development as a writer and as a wrestler, two things that happened to be very close to John Irving's own heart, since he was a wrestling coach at Vermont Academy and he, obviously, was a novelist. Garp, in his formative years is regarded with distrust and unease. He and his mother are spoken about behind his back, but he doesn't understand the insults. Garp and his mother lived at the Steering School, an all boys boarding school. His mother worked as a nurse the entire time they were there. Through his time there, Garp would develop his love for writing, which he would always be proficient in, and he developed a love for wrestling. Garp at first didn't know much about sports, except that he didn't like many of them, was signed up for wrestling by his mother. Garp would befriend the coach, Ernie Holm and his daughter, Helen, who read as much as she could in the wrestling room. Garp, as he went through school, fell in love with Helen Holm. He began to write to her, short stories that he believed would win her over. He continued to write to her as much as possible, even when she began attending a different boarding school that was far away. She would critique his work and tell him how she felt. She would be his first audience, and her avid reading would always pose a challenge to him, forcing him to give her things to read. When he graduated high school, Garp and his mother went to Vienna to write, each for their own reasons. Jenny went to write her autobiography, which she hoped would help women make their own choices, independent of men. Garp went to write the story that would make Helen Holm love him, and would convince her to marry him. Both would return to find that they had been successful. The rest of the story would focus on Garp's development of identity as the things he loves are stripped away from him, and how his identity would change not only the way he acted, but also the way he wrote. It showed Garp's decent into anger and self-pity, and how his losses began to cloud his writing. It is in this decent that his writing becomes famous, it is with his worst book that he begins to be recognized, and he hates this. The story ends just as Garp is beginning to find his innocence again, but his past catches up to him, and he is killed by a person who hated him for what he had done in the past. I would recommend this book to anyone looking for a serious look into the deeply emotional and entirely human world of writing. This book provides a look into the human psyche, and tells of a person among us, not of something removed from our lives, but that of someone who lives on our block and comes to our parties. This is the world according to John Irving; life is complicated, but we all chose how seriously we take it. We all lead a life according to ourselves and we have to accept responsibility for it.

Rating:
Summary: A True Gem!
Review: The World According to Garp is one of the best books I have ever read. It is filled with sex, anti-sex, love, heart-ache, dark humor, family values, the list goes on and on. Irving mastered characterization in this novel, by giving us just enough for us to connect with the characters, but not too much to bore us. I was intrigued from the first chapter, and sad when the book ended...not because of the story, but because I just wanted more!

Rating:
Summary: Tagged
Review: Not the best book I've ever read. But always the first one that comes to mind when I start talking about books.

Not the great American novel. But something special. This book has tagged me.

Like a pigeon has been tagged, this book just keeps coming back to me. Or do I keep coming back to it?

A writers self examination of his writing this book is a blue print for how to write. That makes it a self conscious book. But its not a book about itself. Its a book about writing, and a writer, and his mother, who writes.

One can feel the hand of the author on the characters. That in fact is the most tangible flaw/uniqueness/gift that this book brings. It doesn't intentionally do this like Vonnegut would, but it drags the shadow of John Irving with it wherever it goes.

And it goes a lot of places!

The characters are warm and real and false and thin. Such contrasts and contradictions. But you love them. And you want to watch them. And its ok. They are more real than you're average day. You want to protect them. Then there's John Irving.

You want to strangle him and talk to him. He's almost a character in the play. Perhaps it is a melodrama.

Perhaps it is life. Either way I loved it and I hated it and I read it again. It tagged me. I came back.

Rating:
Summary: Bizarre and entertaining
Review: What a different read. Utterly strange but realistic, the story of our hero? Garp is just too weird, but so unfantastic as to be believable. So full of irony and black humor, without being tedious, this book is a great read, you'll love it. Irving is an amazing writer, how skilled do you have to be, to write stories for a writer, who you made up? And in reading them, you picture the fictional writer as have written them. WOW. A seriously recommended reading.

Rating:
Summary: In the words of T.S. Garp, "We are all terminal cases."
Review: I first read THE WORLD ACCORDING TO GARP in 1982, the year the movie adaptation came out. I was a great fan of Robin Williams (MORK & MINDY still being on television at the time), and because I was far too young to view the film, I decided to read its source novel. Actually, I did an oral report on it, much to the chagrin of my 6th grade teacher. It's hard to do an oral report when the rest of the class is awestruck at the use of the word 'bastard'. I did very well, but the teacher did recommend that I stick to less challenging works, considering my age. Thankfully, I did not listen.

In the many times I have reread GARP since, I have never failed to be struck dumb by the sheer elegance and beauty, not to mention brutality, of John Irving's novel. While Irving's writing have too often been described as 'Dickensian', it is truly an accurate summation. Irving presents a family saga rife with bizarre yet realistic characters, all swirling around what very well may the finest character put to paper in the 20th century, T.S. Garp.

Garp is the bastard son (there's that word again) of Jenny Fields, a sometimes nurse and headmistress, who doesn't believe in anyone but herself, and her son. As Garp matures, finding success as an author, Jenny inadvertently eclipses his fame with her own autobiography, which catapults her to the forefront of the feminist movement.

I won't say more about the plot, because nothing else would suffice. To try and describe it any further might inadvertently gloss over the innumerable circumstances that make up Garp's life. Already, many single scenes come flooding back to memory: Garp, as a child, stranded precariously on the roof of a dormitory, trying to find a pigeon; Garp as a teen, experiencing his first sexual encounter, as well as a more fierce encounter with a large black dog named Bonkers; Garp (in arguably the most haunting moment) turning off his car's engine and quietly gliding up his driveway in the dark, as his son whispers, "It's like a dream!"

Irving's other characters run the gamut, from odorific professors to brain-dead war heroes. There's Roberta Muldoon, a former linebacker-turned-transexual; Ellen James, the tragic and unwanting figurehead of a truly weird cult; and Poo, the sister of one of Garp's first girlfriends. Irving weaves his characters and situations together in a breathtaking dance. And despite the dance's immense complexity, he never once loses his step.

Irving has also become famous (justifiably so) for a story Garp pens within the novel, THE PENSION GRILLPARZER. While this story is terrific, it has overshadowed the rest of Garp's work found within the pages of the novel. Irving performs a neat trick, in that Garp's style of writing, while similar to Irving's, is not exactly the same. Irving writes from Garp's viewpoint, ensuring that Garp has a voice of his own. While GRILLPARZER is famous, an excerpt from one of Garp's later novels is equally memorable. In the story, a young housewife is raped, while a police officer tracks the rapist down. While it feels like an Irving novel, it also doesn't; it is far nastier and more grotesque than anything else Irving has written. It is not Irving's story, it is Garp's, providing a telling glimpse into Garp's anguished soul.

GARP is a tragedy, with funny parts. It is a comedy, with heart-wrenching moments. It is riotously funny, and crushingly moving. It is a story of writers, and insanity, and adultry, and terminal cases. Like the best novels, it displays the entire life of an individual the reader would not otherwise get to know. It presents you with places you want to see, and people you wouldn't mind sharing a beer with. It is Irving's best work, and a landmark in American literature.

Rating:
Summary: The True and Tragic World of Garp
Review: Quite possibly one of the best and most enjoyable books I've ever read. This is a fast-paced story of sex, sexuality, and lust with a tragic mix of all three. Artfully exciting and unbelievable at times, startlingly real and depressing at others, John Irving has created a wonderful story. The seemingly simple characters each have their own face and appeal to the reader, adding a sense of connection to the story. In a struggle to make a name for himself as a writer, Garp struggles with the contrasting image of fame his mother found as both a write and feminist. But John Irving also slips the reader inside an artist's mind to see the world as he sees. Seeing everything as it is, as we all see it. But the artist picks up the detail, gives up everything to be drawn into what it is he or she is doing, to capture the moment as it really is. We see the turmoil of Garp and his struggle in this crazy and painful world. John Wolf, Garp's editor in the story, makes a statement on the flap jacket of one of Garp's books that shows we all live in a "world accoring to Garp." "..A man who is so fearful of bad things happening to his loved ones that he creates an atmosphere of such tension that bad things are almost certain to occur. And they do." As difficult as a story like this is to summarize, the twists and turns that the story takes are captivating. To be honest, I am no avid reader. But this is one of the few books I have been unable to put down. For an exciting, fast-paced story of our lives and the world we live in I would recommend this book to you.

Rating:
Summary: Well written, though I'm still not sure how much I like it.
Review: Ironic that people say this book is about being a writer, since Garp is not really a very successful or even a very good writer. Still, Irving drags the reader into Garp's head, and even months after reading this book, I see or hear things and think "Garp". Part of Irving's brilliance is the inclusion of stories written by Garp - it makes the character more realistic, and makes it easier to identify with him. Not everything in this story is pretty - there is rape, adultery, and a horrible accident caused by parental selfishness. Still, it's masterfully written, a good example of a 20th century literary work of art.

Rating:
Summary: the real thing
Review: In other reviews you will see words like "unique", "original", "brilliant", "permanent", "audacious", "funny", "heartbreaking", "wise". No need to repeat those here.

You can probably read elsewhere too about how the characters are wonderfully well-drawn, that the structure, from the plot down to individual sentences, is consistently well-executed, about how wry and warm and extremely observant and funny John Irving is as he writes in his way -- and it is his way in more than just style, this book being an autobiography of sorts -- about the comedy of the human condition.

If I were to stab at a summary -- a difficult task, as one reviewer said, "[the book] defies synopsis" -- I'd say that the book is about being a writer, about being the real thing.

So here are a few excerpts from this synopsis-defying book, to try to capture its gist:

From the 'Meditations' of Marcus Aurelius:
"In the life of a man his time is but a moment, his being in incessant flux, his sense a dim rushlight, this body a prey of worms, his soul an unquiet eddy, his fortune dark, his fame doubtful. In short, all that is body is as coursing waters, all that is of the soul as dreams and vapors.'

From the end of Garp's first published story:
"... a storyteller who is accepting of unhappy endings, as if her life and her companions had never been exotic to _her_ -- as if they had always been staging a ludicrous and doomed effort at reclassification."

Garp's kindly old teacher says of the story in his trademark stutter:
"It is rich with lu-lu-lunacy and sorrow."

And a typical Garp-ism:
"Garp took baby Jenny to the wrestling room... Helen claimed that the mat would give the child the misconception that the world underfoot felt like a barely firm sponge. 'But that is what the world _does_ feel like,' Garp said."

Rating:
Summary: A true Masterpiece!
Review: Without going into some superfluous florid explanation on a brilliant book, I have only one sentence to discribe the book to the reader or would be reader. In the world of Garp, feminist fanatics, bears on unicycles, transexual football players, and mindful parents committing adultry are all too common, just like the "real" world. "The World According to Garp" is a commentary on themes such as lust, isolation, and rape. So I lied about the succinct review...