Be Specific About Books In Favor Of Straight Man
| Original Title: | Straight Man |
| ISBN: | 0375701907 (ISBN13: 9780375701900) |
| Edition Language: | English |
| Characters: | William Henry Devereaux, Jr |
| Setting: | Pennsylvania(United States) |
Richard Russo
Paperback | Pages: 391 pages Rating: 4.02 | 23574 Users | 2411 Reviews
Define About Books Straight Man
| Title | : | Straight Man |
| Author | : | Richard Russo |
| Book Format | : | Paperback |
| Book Edition | : | Special Edition |
| Pages | : | Pages: 391 pages |
| Published | : | June 9th 1998 by Vintage (first published January 1st 1997) |
| Categories | : | Fiction. Humor. Contemporary. Novels. Academic. Academia. Literature. Literary Fiction |
Description During Books Straight Man
In this uproarious new novel, Richard Russo performs his characteristic high-wire walk between hilarity and heartbreak. Russo's protagonist is William Henry Devereaux, Jr., the reluctant chairman of the English department of a badly underfunded college in the Pennsylvania rust belt. Devereaux's reluctance is partly rooted in his character--he is a born anarchist-- and partly in the fact that his department is more savagely divided than the Balkans.In the course of a single week, Devereaux will have his nose mangled by an angry colleague, imagine his wife is having an affair with his dean, wonder if a curvaceous adjunct is trying to seduce him with peach pits, and threaten to execute a goose on local television. All this while coming to terms with his philandering father, the dereliction of his youthful promise, and the ominous failure of certain vital body functions. In short, Straight Man is classic Russo--side-splitting and true-to-life, witty, compassionate, and impossible to put down.
Rating About Books Straight Man
Ratings: 4.02 From 23574 Users | 2411 ReviewsWeigh Up About Books Straight Man
I remember almost nothing about Richard Russo's Straight Man. I imagine I laughed a couple of times, and I think I enjoyed the reading experience, but there is only one specific thing that I remember from the book itself. More on that later, though, because I want to talk about the peripheral things I remember about Straight Man.I remember reading it for a Literary Theory class (my first class at my new University) with one of my all time favourite profs, Dr. W---. He admitted, very early intoI'm beginning to wonder if Russo is a one book man. First, I'm getting tired of his smarter than everyone snappy mouthed wife of protagonist role that ran throughout this and Bridge. Second, this has got to be the all time most unlikeable leading male ever, and sometimes that can be fun (I don't know why but I feel that is more true with heroines) but here it was simply irritating. Hank had a constant barrage of supposedly clever lines that fell flat and just made him out to be a jerk and
William Henry Hank Devereaux is temporary chair of the humanities department of a bad community college with budget problems in Railton, PA. Hank is a scamp, a man who cant seem to take anything seriously, and therefore this book is sometimes hilariousa romp through the inane political infighting of academia from a man in the throes of a midlife crisis.Either Im one of these people or Im not. . . . I should either throw in my lot with them, live among them, my friends and colleagues, or take my
I have read enough of Richard Russos novels to become very familiar with his style of writing and storytelling. The types of characters he creates, the settings in which he places his characters, how he builds his characters and the type of conflict he creates in his stories. While some level of predictability comes with this familiarity, I continue to enjoy Russos work. For one thing, he makes me laugh. I also enjoy his characters and find myself rooting for them despite their insistence on
Ahhh. Never has a book made me feel so good about not going into academia.William "Hank" Henry Devereaux, Jr. is the embattled head of a rivalry-tastic English department in a crumbling liberal arts college. Over the novel's four days, all heck breaks loose -- while his wife is out of town, Hank's department goes haywire, his daughter's marriage dissolves, his nose is mutilated by a coworker, he threatens to kill a goose on local television . . . oh, there's a drunken episode involving a hot
I have long avoided academic satires for two main reasons. The first is that I myself am an academic of sorts and I already know how ridiculous I am. Second: the genre has always seemed to me like shooting fish (with PhDs) in a barrel.But now, I'm going on the academic job market this year, so I've decided some comic relief about my chosen profession might be a good thing. The main reason being: if I can tell myself on some level that it's all a giant cluster-cuss of ego-surfing solipsistic
"What ails people is never simple, and William of Occam, who provided mankind with a beacon of rationality by which to view the world of physical circumstance, knew better than to apply his razor to the irrational, where entities multiply like strands of a virus under a microscope"Straight Man is the fourth novel by Pulitzer Prize-winning American novelist, Richard Russo. William Henry Devereaux Jnr, (Hank) at almost fifty, is interim chairman of the English department at the (chronically
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