The Tragedy of Arthur Arthur Phillips David Aaron Baker 9781449864910 Books
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The Tragedy of Arthur is an emotional and elaborately constructed tour de force from bestselling and critically acclaimed novelist Arthur Phillips, “one of the best writers in America” (The Washington Post).
Its doomed hero is Arthur Phillips, a young man struggling with a larger-than-life father, a con artist who works wonders of deception but is a most unreliable parent. Arthur is raised in an enchanted world of smoke and mirrors where the only unshifting truth is his father’s and his beloved twin sister’s deep and abiding love for the works of William Shakespeare—a love so pervasive that Arthur becomes a writer in a misguided bid for their approval and affection.
Years later, Arthur’s father, imprisoned for decades and nearing the end of his life, shares with Arthur a treasure he’s kept secret for half a century a previously unknown play by Shakespeare, titled The Tragedy of Arthur. But Arthur and his sister also inherit their father’s mission to see the play published and acknowledged as the Bard’s last great gift to humanity. . . .
Unless it’s their father’s last great con.
By turns hilarious and haunting, this virtuosic novel—which includes Shakespeare’s (?) lost King Arthur play in its five-act entirety—captures the very essence of romantic and familial love and betrayal. The Tragedy of Arthur explores the tension between storytelling and truth-telling, the thirst for originality in all our lives, and the act of literary mythmaking, both now and four centuries ago, as the two Arthurs—Arthur the novelist and Arthur the ancient king—play out their individual but strangely intertwined fates.
A New York Times Notable Book • A New Yorker Reviewers’ Favorite of the Year • A Wall Street Journal Best Novel of the Year • A San Francisco Chronicle Best Book of the Year • A Chicago Tribune Favorite Book of the Year • A Library Journal Top Ten Book of the Year • A Kirkus Reviews Best Book of the Year • One of Salon’s five best novels of the year
The Tragedy of Arthur Arthur Phillips David Aaron Baker 9781449864910 Books
This novel is purportedly the introduction to a newly-discovered (and possibly fraudulent) play by William Shakespeare, entitled The Tragedy of Arthur. The purported discover (or possible forger) is one Arthur Phillips, and the "introduction" is written by his son, also Arthur Phillips. You will have noted that the author of the book is ----- Arthur Phillips!! And the last section of the "The Tragedy of Arthur: A Novel" is Shakespeare's putative play, "The Tragedy of Arthur".Clearly we have lots of fun with structure and various levels of fiction going on here, which could be viewed as post-modern but strikes me as good old literary fun and games. Phillips alludes to Nabokov, and that's what the novel reminds me of, though it does not achieve Nabokovian brilliance. In addition to Nabokov, one senses possibly a dash of Lewis Carroll, Max Beerbohm, etc. etc.
I found it very, very funny, and got quite caught up in the trials of the protagonist. I also found it an interesting meditation (to use too fancy a word, that's just what comes to mind at present) on Shakespeare, on our relationship to Shakespeare, on what makes art Art, etc. etc. As a Shakespeare devotee I should possibly have been put off by the author's clearly unhagiographical view of the Bard. One lady I discussed this with as we waited for "All's Well" to start up in Central Park was furious at the book, even though she hadn't read it and had no intention of doing so. But it is an interesting book, and Shakespeare can survive a bit of ragging. Recommended, especially to the English majors of the world.
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The Tragedy of Arthur Arthur Phillips David Aaron Baker 9781449864910 Books Reviews
It is refreshing to find a book that clever, witty, original, and readable at the same time. For me personally, it's also good to read any readable work about Shakespeare! Here is a winner! In "The Tragedy of Arthur" by Arthur Phillips, we find it all a very readable work by Arthur Phillips.
A young novelist (Arthur Phillips) has a load of baggage (more than Louis Vuitton or some politicians!). The ramifications of his entire family and how he is dealing with that scenario should be enough for anyone. At the heart of all this is the fact that the character Arthur "inherits" a long-lost (certainly unheard of) play by the Bard himself. What a secret! And what a treasure. His father, a flim flam man of the first water and a big fan of Shakespeare himself, reveals this "find" on his deathbed. How to "produce" this "find" is something else, owing to the literary historians/skeptics out there. What intrigue! (One can only imagine the ramifications and the reactions to such a find!) There are other aspects of this complex, yet refreshing story, "autobiographical" or not, which enhances and intrigues the story line. It's a book that, for me, needed to be read slowly, just to make sure one gets the full picture, but worth whatever effort one might put forth.
The novel concludes with the Shakespearean "play" ("The Tragedy of Arthur")--that in itself is worth the read. My hat goes off to the author Arthur Phillips--really, really clever, sir!
Half fictional memoir, half five-act play in the style of Shakespeare, "The Tragedy of Arthur" extends, with a wink and a nod, to the personality of the memoirist himself, a novelist named Arthur Phillips, Harold Bloom's thesis that Shakespeare invented human personality the memoirist's life, lusts, and confused upbringing parallel those of the central character in the Shakespeare play, Arthur, King of the Britons. As the memoir explains, the play was written either by the Immortal Bard (and then lost for more than four centuries) or by the memoirist's father, another Arthur Phillips, a Shakespeare devotee and an habitual forger who justifies his criminal efforts as the simple creation of wonder. ("Your Honor, I ask you, isn't creating wonder what artists do?") In any case, a copy of the play, said by Arthur pere to have been filched from the library of an English country estate, passes like royal entitlement from father to son, and from there to a publisher's small army of experts in watermarks, typesetting, word creation, word usage, word association, and the like, who pronounce it genuine.
All of this -- the Shakespeare scholarship, the literary history, the copyright concerns, the interactions with agents and lawyers threatening litigation, the criminal predilections of the English landed gentry, the confusion of art and reality and unreality -- is fun stuff. When memoirist Arthur Phillips and the leading Shakespeare scholar parry annotations to the play, one of them earnest and arcane, the other thumbing his nose, "Pale Fire" and its put-down of literary critics are not far away.
I hope you will enjoy the play itself. I did not, but I was mostly absent when Shakespeare was discussed in high school and college. On the other hand, I enjoyed the memoir's characters and interactions. Phillips writes insightfully and with a practiced sense of humor.
In the (presumably fictional) autobiographical (presumably fictional, but borrowing heavily from threads of his "real" life) introduction to this recently discovered long-lost play of William Shakespeare, Arthur Phillips' (presumably fictional) father often encourages his children to create wonder in the world, as he tries to do with several of his con-man schemes and large-scale practical jokes (at least one of which lands him in jail). Real or not, Phillips' father would be immensely proud to read this wonder-filled book, which bursts with comedy, drama, and erudition, and is brilliantly written--all quite Bard-like in this regard. But nothing can prepare you for the genius of the "found" play, told in perfect Shakespearean verse (a Shakespeare scholar told me that not even the most renowned experts in his field could pen such a perfect "facsimile" as Phillips has done here).
I haven't enjoyed a book so much in a long time, and certainly not this year. You owe it to yourself, or to anyone who likes Shakespeare, to hit the Buy now button on this tremendous work of fiction (at least, so it seems!).
This novel is purportedly the introduction to a newly-discovered (and possibly fraudulent) play by William Shakespeare, entitled The Tragedy of Arthur. The purported discover (or possible forger) is one Arthur Phillips, and the "introduction" is written by his son, also Arthur Phillips. You will have noted that the author of the book is ----- Arthur Phillips!! And the last section of the "The Tragedy of Arthur A Novel" is Shakespeare's putative play, "The Tragedy of Arthur".
Clearly we have lots of fun with structure and various levels of fiction going on here, which could be viewed as post-modern but strikes me as good old literary fun and games. Phillips alludes to Nabokov, and that's what the novel reminds me of, though it does not achieve Nabokovian brilliance. In addition to Nabokov, one senses possibly a dash of Lewis Carroll, Max Beerbohm, etc. etc.
I found it very, very funny, and got quite caught up in the trials of the protagonist. I also found it an interesting meditation (to use too fancy a word, that's just what comes to mind at present) on Shakespeare, on our relationship to Shakespeare, on what makes art Art, etc. etc. As a Shakespeare devotee I should possibly have been put off by the author's clearly unhagiographical view of the Bard. One lady I discussed this with as we waited for "All's Well" to start up in Central Park was furious at the book, even though she hadn't read it and had no intention of doing so. But it is an interesting book, and Shakespeare can survive a bit of ragging. Recommended, especially to the English majors of the world.
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