A Confederacy of Dunces (Unabridged)
Narrator: Barrett Whitener
Audio Length: 13 hours: 33 minutes
Found on iTunes and audible.com

A Book with Two Stories

I have a thing for dysfunctional artistic people. If a painter or writer has any type of addiction or show any signs of mental instability, you will be sure to find a piece of their work on my walls or in my bookcase. My favorites include Vincent van Gogh who painted between spells of madness and cut off a piece of his own ear; Edgar Allan Poe who many said was a drunk and a drug addict, and Virginia Woolf who suffered from mental illness and committed suicide by drowning herself. It was inevitable that I would discover the work of John Kennedy Toole, a frustrated and despondent author. However, I am saddened that I only need space on my bookshelf for one of his well known novels, A Confederacy of Dunces. I love this book. It is timeless, comical, sad, unpredictable, and unforgettable.

Toole committed suicide in 1969 at the age of thirty-two after failing to find anyone to publish a manuscript he had written while he was in the army. Seven years later, his mother began pestering American novelist, Walker Percy, to read an unsolicited manuscript. Percy was convinced that Thelma D. Toole was an overzealous student who wanted to impress him. He was incredulous when he learned the truth behind her calls. She wanted him to read a novel that had been written by her son who was now dead.

Percy managed to wiggle out of making a telephone commitment to read the manuscript, but when Thelma appeared in his office one afternoon, he agreed to read one page. It’s a Cinderella story. He couldn’t stop reading and convinced the Louisiana State University Press to publish the novel in 1980. The book was copyrighted under Thelma’s name. In 1981, the Pulitzer Prize for fiction was awarded posthumously to her son, John Kennedy Toole.

In this novel, you will find no conventional love story, no hero, homeless kittens, or friendly aliens. A Confederacy of Dunces is a book about a thirty-year-old man who lives in New Orleans with his mother.

Ignatius J. Reilly is fat, sloppy, overeducated and unemployed. He spends most of his time in his bedroom writing nonsensical essays on Big Chief tablets. His floor is littered with the pages of unsent and unsolicited essays about society and perceived injustices fate has thrown in his path. The air is stale and persistently perfumed by fresh explosions of spontaneous flatulence, while the bed sheets are often moist with the liquid of solo sexual encounters. He may not sound like the perfect houseguest or coveted mystery date, but I found him a character I love to hate.

Irene Reilly is a widow on welfare. She keeps a few bottles of extra wine in the oven and finds that bowling helps her arthritis. She is protective of her son, Ignatius, and yet, she sees that she is the main cause of his laziness. There were times when I just wanted her to smack Ignatius, and other times when I wanted to smack her for emotionally abusing Ignatius.

It seems that the other characters in this novel were created by Toole mainly to annoy Ignatius. There is Myrna Minkoff, a nymphomaniac ex-girlfriend, who delights in writing odd correspondence on whatever paper she can find and usually ends her letters reminding Ignatius that he needs to have sex. There is the patrol officer who is demoted, thanks to Ignatius, and is forced by his captain to dress in weird outfits while on duty. Santa, the patrol officer’s aunt, becomes Irene’s best friend. Santa introduces Irene to a man who was inadvertently accused by the patrol officer of communism and it’s a match made in heaven minus Ignatius. Gus Levy is the owner of a failing business that employs Ignatius, and later, a desperate French Quarter hotdog vendor tries to rally the once again unemployed Ignatius into a salesperson. Also along the way are three lesbians with a fondness for violence, a man working below minimum wage, a dancer with a parrot, a barmaid with a passion for pornography, a man who likes hats, a dead dog buried in the front yard, and a senile secretary who loves lunchmeat and scraps of fabric.

John Kennedy Toole refuses to waste one character in this novel and develops each with unique physical and social characteristics. It sounds complicated, but he has woven these characters into several easy to follow storylines. The main plot begins when Ignatius is forced by his mother to find a job. He works for a short time at an antiquated pants factory, Levy Pants, where he tries to unionize the workers and writes a libelous letter before being fired. His next job is with Paradise Vendors selling pre-cooked wieners. His wages are low and he eats most of the product, but he loves the pirate outfit he gets to wear.

The reader follows Ignatius everywhere and shares his innermost thoughts through his journal pages. At times, I was embarrassed for his actions, but couldn’t wait until the next encounter with an innocent bystander. While I was busy laughing to tears, the story seemed to keep going without me at some points. In the background, a story of fraud, near fortune, and awkward romance were coming together to reach a climax that I found unexpected. I hate to spoil any of the plots, but I will say that the main and minor characters seem to trade places of importance on every other page. I liked the end; I just didn’t see it coming. When I finished, I kept thinking about what would happen tomorrow. It was hard to close the book on Ignatius and I often still think about him.

Have a great week!
Chel