- Paperback
- Publisher: Picador USA (January 2003)
- ISBN-10: 0312290020
- ISBN-13: 978-0312290023
- Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
|
||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||
Product Details |
Product Description
From Publishers Weekly
Musing on Rousseau, the French encyclopedists and the vagaries of chance and identity, Crumey (Pfitz; D'Alembert's Principle) has written another novel of ideas in the grand tradition of Calvino, Borges and Kundera. This delightful romp around the knottiest concerns raised by Enlightenment philosophers and postmodernists alike centers on the long-vanished Rosier's Encyclopaedia, a 200-year-old French text that may challenge the existence of the universe. Setting out to track down Rosier's work, dotty old Mr. Mee, a reclusive British book collector, embarks on a quest that introduces him to the Internet in all its seamy variety (he finds an unclad woman reading a Rosier-related text on one site) and brings on the attentions of a "life scientist" named Catriona, who introduces him to the pleasures of the flesh. Mee's narrative alternates with that of a Dr. Petrie, a professor of French literature desperately in love with one of his students, and Ferrand and Minard, the bumbling 18th-century French copyists charged with reproducing Rosier's original manuscript. Mee may be the most endearing narrator, and Ferrand and Minard the most haplessly slapstick, but Petrie proves the most perceptive, lacing his lovelorn lamentations with reflections on Proust and Flaubert. Crumey also provides tantalizing glimpses of the Encyclopaedia itself, its treatises all absurdly outdated and yet provocatively applicable to modern-day computer science and physics. The novel isn't perfect--its philosophical asides can be hard going, and it's easy to lose patience with the exaggerated ineptitude of all its narrators--but Crumey's light treatment of hefty material should win the minds, if not the hearts, of his readers. (Mar.)Forecast: Crumey has yet to achieve the name recognition of Umberto Eco or even Arturo P‚rez-Reverte, but this strong effort and the many glowing reviews it's bound to receive should attract a few more readers to him.
Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.From Library Journal
In what has become his trademark narrative style, British novelist Crumey (Pfitz, D'Alembert's Principle) offers readers three ongoing stories loosely intertwined on a philosophical spool. The title character is an elderly and incredibly sheltered scholar who, in the course of the volume, learns about both computers and the female anatomy. The other two tales involve a pair of ne'er-do-well 18th-century French copyists who come a cropper of Jean-Jacques Rousseau as well as a contemporary philosophy professor with a penchant for a young female student. While each of these stories is moderately clever, none of the male characters is sympathetic, and the female characters have frustratingly brief walk-ons that promise more intellectual stimulation than they are allowed to deliver. The three tales are drawn together in a messy denouement that is neither engaging nor insightful. While there are a few standout passages along the wayAincluding the scene in which Mr. Mee describes his initial introduction to the InternetAthere is little to recommend this to any audience.AFrancisca Goldsmith, Berkeley P.L., CA
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Tag this product(What's this?)Think of a tag as a keyword or label you consider is strongly related to this product.
Tags will help all customers organize and find favorite items. |
Customer Reviews
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most helpful customer reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars
Internet Porn and Enightenment Philosophers,
By
This review is from: Mr. Mee: A Novel (Paperback)
Mr. Mee is very much a novel of ideas, and much of the ï¿actionï¿ of the novel comes in the form of Crumeyï¿s playful tweaking of intellectual and literary history and his insistent investigation into philosophical questions of reality, fantasy, and imagination. Through a prolonged examination of the legacies of Rousseau, Proust, andï¿to a lesser extentï¿Flaubert, Crumey creates a novel in which fact is inextricably conjoined with fiction, and the line between reality and fantasy becomes very problematic indeed.The novel is distinguished by a complex intertextuality in which three separate narratives weave in and out of each other, connecting, confirming, contradicting. The first is the epistolary record of Mr. Mee, an elderly antiquarian in search of the elusive and possibly apocryphal Rosierï¿s Encyclopedia. The second (and finest) of the three narratives chronicles the adventures of Ferrand and Minard, two bumbling characters who are forced to flee Paris after a commission to copy the Encyclopedia involves them in murder and conspiracy. The third concerns a literature professor's preoccupations with issues of memory and imagination as he contemplates seducing one of his students. Although there are some distracting philosophical asides and some forced humor, Crumey manages to create a playfully inventive fiction that examines the intellectual legacy of the Enlightenment in light of information theory and quantum mechanics. If that sounds interesting to you, by all means proceed. If not, you'll be better off looking elsewhere.
4.0 out of 5 stars
Apparently not for everyone,
By
This review is from: MR. MEE: A Novel (Hardcover)
I just finished this book, and was curious how it was reviewed by others. I don't think I've ever seen a book with so wild a divergence of opinion, (1 star, 3 stars and 5 stars).I thought the book was clever and fun. Mr. Crumey had me laughing out loud many times at the inventive activity of the fairly well developed characters. I look forward to checking out his other offerings
1.0 out of 5 stars
Please do not buy this book,
By A Customer
This review is from: MR. MEE: A Novel (Hardcover)
Amazon recommended this book for me, but I don't know what I did to anger them. Some of this story is told from the perspective of a 90 plus year old, Mr. Mee, who speaks with complete ignorance about the world wide web, and a woman a jogger he meets on the street who he is afraid is injuring herself because her breasts move so violently as she runs. Maybe the character is having a good time, but I can't imagine any reader could be. Buy this book only if you are incapable of getting annoyed.
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
Want to see more reviews on this item?
|
Most recent customer reviews |
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Feedback
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
