When Frank, an Irish dwarf, writes a personal memoir, he moves from dark isolation into the public eye. This luminous journey is marked by memories of his lonely childhood, secrets of his doomed young mother, and his passion for a woman who is as unreachable as the stars.
| ||||||||||||||||||
Book Description
Product Details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
Product Description
From Publishers Weekly
"Begin with beauty," commands the opening sentence of this powerful novel, suffused with a 19th-century Romantic sensibility; its trite, although heartfelt, closing plea--"Hold me"--encapsulates the narrative's shift in focus from wide-ranging contemplation to the personal realization of love. Set in Cork, Ireland, this philosophic, imaginatively plotted tale is narrated by Frank Bois, a 43-year-old dwarf who has just completed a semi-autobiographical book. In a rambling internal dialogue he reminisces about the events his volume covers: his birth after WW II; his emotionally distant mother, who took many lovers; and his early decision to sublimate his sexuality (after a prostitute told him, "Be gone, ye little dork") by immersing himself in a passion for the moon and stars. Frank interrupts the chronological narrative with personal meditations, some about his writing career; he considers his book a literary freak show, knowing that people are amazed by his appreciation of beauty because, to them, he represents ugliness. Raymo ( In the Falcon's Claw ) so skillfully manipulates the author-within-an-author narration that it's easy to forget that Frank is a fictional entity. His unique, epiphanic and bluntly truthful story forces a reconsideration of the beautiful and the grotesque.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Library Journal
In this novel, Raymo, author of In the Falcon's Claw: A Novel of the Year 1000 ( LJ 1/90), explores alienation--how it can be induced by religious belief, emotional trauma, or physical disability. His protagonist, Frank Bois, resident of Cork, Ireland, is 43 years old and 43 inches tall when we meet him. Frank has lived his adult life cut off from all meaningful human contact. Awash in self-pity over his size, unable to believe in the existence of God, Frank finds solace in observing the heavens and worshiping from afar the physical beauty of women. Through a series of flashbacks, often humorous, we learn of the mishaps that have shaped Frank's life, from his conception aboard an American troopship at the end of World War II to the death of his mother. The opportunity to have his celestial observations published takes Frank to London, where his preconceptions about God, women, and himself are challenged. Raymo has created a character we can all empathize with and for whom we care. This thoughtful, humorous novel is recommended for larger collections.
- Robert J. Andrews, Duluth P.L., Minn.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
- Robert J. Andrews, Duluth P.L., Minn.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
Customer Reviews
Most helpful customer reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Chet Raymo's "The Dork of Cork" follows the night sky ruminations and meanderings of Frank Bois, diminutive bastard son of Bernadette Bois, an ambiguously sympathetic character whom you'll either love to hate or hate to love. She is of a most rare beauty and a rarer-yet ethos and morality, particularly where she and her dwarf son have ended up: in manically-embattled Christian Ireland (and briefly in the dusty Bible Belt of America.)
Trapped in his absurd dwarfism and his mother's life of amoral hedonism, Frank takes us along on his life-long quest for existential value and a platonic ideal of beauty. This duality is made all the more profound, poignant, and ironic by the stark contrast between mother and son wherein each complements the other in a sort of yin-yang template of who we all are. Where one is grotesquely stumpy and grounded in his life, the other is breathtakingly aquiline and ethereal in hers. Yet for each, the essence of self belies the exterior image and hones in on the narrative's excellent opening directive: "Begin with beauty." Mr. Raymo, for his part, does, then maintains its presence to the tale's satisfying conclusion.
Narrative gems like this, "discovered" after a decade's wait on the shelves, again remind me: Good literature waits for us as long as necessary.
Format:Paperback
It's a mystery to me how anyone could fail to love this book and its narrator, Frank Bois. A French-Irish dwarf who's forth-three years old and forty-three inches tall, Frank is a tortured soul deeply in love with Beauty. Feeling his desire to share the wonders of Beauty with another to be doomed, he turns to the star-filled night sky for comfort. Frank's not a serious astronomer and even admits that he rarely makes use of a telescope, but he is a serious student of the universe, both the universe without and the universe within.
All of the characters in this book are spiritually or emotionally broken in some way and all are desperately in need of the healing power of love. As in "real" life, some find it while others do not.
You might think a book peopled with broken characters and narrated by a lonely and reclusive forty-three inch dwarf would be depressing. It's anything but. I can only think of two or three other books as uplifting and life-affirming as THE DORK OF CORK. This book even has moments of high hilarity, times when the characters make you throw back your head and laugh out loud.
This book is deeply insightful, but it's insightful in a very entertaining way. This doesn't mean it shouldn't be taken seriously, though. Although not written in a "high-brow," serious, literary "tone," THE DORK OF CORK is still a book to be taken to heart because it's a book that explores some of the most weighty issues of the business of living. That it does so in an entertaining manner is all to the author's enormous credit.
THE DORK OF CORK does have a storyline but Raymo has chosen to tell it in a rather episodic manner consisting of 120 short chapters. I liked his choice; I felt it was perfect. Even though each chapter only averages three pages in length, the book flows beautifully and is never abrupt or choppy.
One the surface, THE DORK OF CORK may seem to be a lighthearted, fun read, but don't be fooled. There's nothing superficial about this book. It's deeply probing, deeply insightful and ultimately , deeply rewarding.
Format:Paperback
Enough said about the book in the previous reviews. I just want to add my 5 stars. I am so happy to have discovered Chet Raymo. This book has beautiful characters, lines that you want to re-read or memorize, astronomy (not astrology...as you'll see) all told from the perspective of a very unusual character whom you will love by the end of the book.
Want to see more reviews on this item?
›
Go to Amazon.com to see all 28 reviews
4.6 out of 5 stars
Most recent customer reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
EMERGENCY EMERGENCY (dont overlook this one)
you must not overlook this book. its truly one of the greatetest books Ive ever read. I read it a few years back and its one of the few that is so well written and enjoyable, that... Read more
Published on Jan 17 2003 by LA
4.0 out of 5 stars
4 Feet tall and Bulletproof...
Well, just shy of four feet, really.
The central character of this novel, Frank Bois, is a dwarf, 43 inches tall. Read more
Published on Mar 20 2002 by B. Morse
4.0 out of 5 stars
The French-Irish Connection.
This was extremely well-written. A mix of science - stars, mathematics, and a life story of a man who has been born a dwarf and become an author coming to terms with now having to... Read more
Published on Jun 10 2001 by Akethan
1.0 out of 5 stars
Pretentious drivel
As with some of the other reviewers I also bought this book because of its title (and the favorable reviews I read about it). Read more
Published on Dec 27 2000 by W. van Schaik
5.0 out of 5 stars
Highly Recommended
Raymo's book is powerful, transporting, humorous and sad all at once. After reading this work, I understand the difference between language and prose. Read more
Published on Sep 18 2000
4.0 out of 5 stars
Read the book before seeing the movie
The very gentle, rather lyrical film "Frankie Starlight" was based on this book (starring Gabriel Byrne, Anne Parillaud and Georgina Cates). Read more
Published on Jun 25 2000
5.0 out of 5 stars
unique, poetic and lyrical
I can't say enough about this terrific but little known book. When you read a brief summary of the plot, it almost sounds like a spoof -- come on! An irish dwarf astronomer? Read more
Published on Jun 3 2000 by M. H. Bayliss
4.0 out of 5 stars
Twin Peaks in Ireland
Am I the only reader who pictured this so surrealistically? I kept recalling Twin Peaks. Of course there was a dwarf in Twin Peaks, but everyone became bizarre in this book! Read more
Published on Aug 9 1999
4.0 out of 5 stars
imaginative story, great read
i enjoyed this novel alot, but did not find the dork to be particularly sympathetic. there was too much emphasis on his need and desire for beauty in life and no real empathy for... Read more
Published on May 29 1999 by davida@azstarnet.com
5.0 out of 5 stars
This book will stay in my heart forever.
Every now and then a book gives me a glimpse into the meaning of life. Marquez did it for me in Love in the Time of Cholera, Proulx did it in The Shipping News, Guterson did it in... Read more
Published on May 12 1999 by Worldnancy@aol.com
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Feedback
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
