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Title: Byrne: A Novel in Verse
Author: Anthony Burgess
Narrator: Sean Barrett
Format: Unabridged
Length: 3 hrs and 12 mins
Language: English
Release date: 11-20-14
Publisher: Audible Studios
Ratings: 4 of 5 out of 2 votes
Genres: Fiction, Contemporary
Publisher's Summary:
A novel in verse form, Byrne echoes and takes further many of the preoccupations of Burgess's earlier fiction. It tells the story of a rampant Irish artist who, in the early days of the century, goes rapidly to the bad and ends up within Hitler's Third Reich.
Members Reviews:
An amazing novel in verse
An amazing novel in verse. Burgess is one of the greatest writers of the 20th century. Joycean, Nabokovian, Byronic, etc. are deserving praises heaped upon Burgess' work. Now may others be blessed by the adjectival accolade: Burgessian.
A Fantasy of Reality and Consequence
To some this book is a treasure to be treasured, never to be buried in a casket or the back or top shelf, occasionally to be befriended for admiration and fun. There are books which have phrases and sentences, sometimes even paragraphs heavy with thought and emotion that you wish to remember. Byrne is a book to be remembered whole and hence impossible to place in the nooks and crannies of the mind of an aging amateur thespian. The fact that I have enjoyed it and admired it immensely does not mean that I will recommend it to all those I know and will never know.
It is quirky. It is raw. It is much younger than any final work of a great wordsmith. I am not sure it was edited; even by the author. (At this stage, I have to admit that I did not check the writing habits of Mr. Burgess.) There is joy of life, inevitability of approaching death, thoughts of immortality in gross caricature, lewdness, love, affection, family ties, politics, money, interesting locations and events and the foreshadowing of the horrible religious violence and terrorism which has been tormenting the world in increasing doses in the Twent First Century.
But, it is difficult to read. Do you try to read it as verse or prose? In fact can you stop confusing the two while reading?
Do you check the historic, biblical, geographical, latin, archaic names, words, places, that crop up so frequently, or continue in order to enjoy the continuity and hope to look at least some of them up, later.......?
Is it a pretentious style or part of being Anthony Burgess, especially Anthony Burgess in his late years, when he would not care if the book sold a million copies or just a few to people like you and me?
I remember the 19 year old honey haired girl across the street who felt she had to read, understand and talk about the humour of "Inside Mr. Enderby" before she could continue to dazzle the young man who carried the Enderbys and Samuel S's and Molloys and Jakes, Stanleys,
Mike hammers and many others in his mind, not knowing that he was already caught on the hook with lure of the smile, humour, energy and joie de vivre.
I would not have given her Byrne then, but I read Byrne to her now. 36 years later and we both smile and admire and sometimes silently cry very selfishly if not for Byrne, then for Tom and Tim and just a little for all the others and mostly for Mr. Burgess, who will not offer us any more .
Burgess's Byrne great versifying fun
How can I describe "Byrne," a book by Burgess / (Anthony)? Putative novel, his last (O sorrow!). / 'S about one Michael Byrne, a "defective lecherous / Dreamer," all in ottava rima, (borrowed / From Ariosto), but which, to be sure, here is / Livelier and more fun than a carload / Of television sitcoms, no matter they / Be on Sunday, Wednesday or Saturday.
