- Paperback: 288 pages
- Publisher: Vintage Canada; 1st Canadian Edition edition (Jan 4 2005)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 067931282X
- ISBN-13: 978-0679312826
- Product Dimensions: 20.1 x 13.5 x 2 cm
- Shipping Weight: 91 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #29,014 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Publishers Weekly
Carey, who won the Man Booker Prize for his True History of the Kelly Gang, takes another strange but much less well-known episode in Australian history as the basis for this hypnotic novel of personal and artistic obsession. He tells it through the eyes of Lady Sarah Wode-Douglass, editor of a struggling but prestigious London poetry journal, who one day in the early 1970s finds herself accompanying an old family friend, poet and novelist John Slater, out to Malaysia. There they encounter an eccentric Australian expatriate, Christopher Chubb, who concocted, Slater says, a huge literary hoax in Australia just after the war, creating an imaginary genius poet, Bob McCorkle, whose publication by a little magazine led to the suicide of the magazine's editor. Now Chubb offers Lady Sarah a page of poetry that shows undoubted genius and claims it is from a book in his possession. Lady Sarah's every acquisitive instinct is inflamed, but to get her hands on the book she has to listen, as Chubb inflicts on her, Ancient Mariner-like, the amazing story of his own epic struggle with McCorkle. In the end, the vaunted manuscript is revealed to be in the care of Chubb's fierce daughter (long ago kidnapped and raised by McCorkle) and a deranged Chinese woman. To what lengths will Lady Sarah go to get it, and how will the women keep it from her? The tale is a tour de force, with a positively Graham Greene-ish relish in the seamy side of the tropics, a mix of literary detective story and murderous nightmare that is piquantly hair-raising. And just when it seems that Carey's story is his greatest fantastic creation to date, he lets on that the hoax at the heart of it actually took place in Melbourne in 1946. As so often before, this extravagantly gifted writer has created something bewilderingly original and powerful.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
From Booklist
Australian-born Carey is a wily and enthralling storyteller with two Booker Prizes to his credit, the second for his last novel, True History of the Kelly Gang (2001), a fictionalized portrait of an Australian folk hero. Here Carey turns to yet another infamous chapter in his homeland's colorful history, a celebrated literary hoax. John Slater, a famous English poet, and Sarah Wode-Douglass, the self-possessed, obsessive, and very private editor of a little London literary magazine, share the horrific memory of Sarah's mother's terrible death, and seek reconciliation by traveling together to Kuala Lumpur. There they run into Christopher Chubb, a second-rate Australian poet living in abject poverty who claims to have perpetuated the hoax involving Bob McCorkle, an alleged genius whose controversial poems led to an editor's demise. Chubb insists that McCorkle never existed, and yet he tells an astonishing tale of his epic struggles with this monstrous nemesis, a giant of a man who allegedly kidnapped Chubb's young daughter. "I imagined someone and he came into being," says Chubb, thus cuing the reader to Carey's superbly crafted and cannily extrapolated improvisation on Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Delectably suspenseful and wildly inventive, Carey's spellbinding modern Gothic is a shrewd and seductive inquiry into the diabolical dimension of the imagination. Donna Seaman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
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Most helpful customer reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
In pursuit of perfect poetry,
By Stephen A. Haines (Ottawa, Ontario Canada) - See all my reviews (HALL OF FAME) (TOP 50 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME)
This review is from: My Life as a Fake (Paperback)
For a nation with so many fine writers, Australia has an unusual number of "fakes" of one kind or another. Not many years ago, a young British immigrant woman almost passed herself off as a Ukrainian refugee. A white male writer masqueraded as an Aborigine woman. Literary posturing isn't new nor unique to Australia, but writers there seem to be trying to launch a new genre through it. Peter Carey's book isn't an attempt to become a cornerstone of this potential realm. Through a narrative that binds the reader to every page, he re-constructs a fictional account of one of Australia's better known early attempts at literary chicanery.In Australia, the "Ern Malley" affair remains notorious - poems supposedly penned by an unknown genius of the 1940s. Carey bases his tale on this scandal, bringing a fresh sense of life and place to his characters. He introduces Sarah Wode-Douglass, London literary magazine editor, and the man she's long considered her family's nemesis, John Slater. Sarah - known to Slater as "Micks" is lured to Kuala Lumpur, leading her to a disheveled old Australian, Christopher Chubb. Chubb has a secret, which he dangles enticingly before the editor. It's a collection of poetry by a Bob McCorkle, who Chubb invented. The invention was to have highlighted the failure of the Australian literary elite to understand real poetry. In doing so, it would provide a comeuppance to Chubb's former classmate and editor of "Personae", David Weiss. The situation gets out of hand when Weiss issues the work and is charged with "publishing obscenity" by an over-zealous Melbourne policeman. Worse for Chubb, Bob McCorkle emerges as a "real" figure pursuing Chubb and demanding recognition as the "poetic genius" he's been depicted. Chubb both chases and flees McCorkle, ending up in Malaysia on a bizarre quest. Chubb/Carey creates a monster in McCorkle - a massive man with violent tendencies, bent on retrieving a reputation he's never earned. Lacking the violence, Chubb seeks his own recognition through Micks, and this story is dictated to her during her time in "KL". She must endure a world entirely alien to her while negotiating for the manuscript with a man who is forthcoming in one way, but highly elusive in others. Carey's handling of this tale is masterful. Even had it not been based on true events, his relation of it is flawless. The characters may seem outlandish in many respects, but the author conveys them with precision and finesse. Sarah is obsessed with her lust for the collection - one is almost reminded of the editors of the post-modernist journal "Social Text" blindly gobbling Alan Sokal's wonderful hoax. Post-modernism has launched many bizarre tales. Carey's knowledge of place is equally compelling as he takes us from KL, through Melbourne, Sydney and back to the Malay jungles. There are warlords, asides in time and place - none of which interrupt the narrative, since each provides enhancement - and a bruising finale. This is one of Carey's supreme works, standing with "Illywhacker" and his fabricated history of Ned Kelly's career. [stephen a. haines - Ottawa, Canada]
4.0 out of 5 stars
Left Thinking,
By A Customer
This review is from: My Life as a Fake (Hardcover)
This book started out fascinating. I was gripped from page one and wanted to know what would happen. I enjoyed the images the writing brought to me. The flow is wonderful and enjoyable. I did not give it 5 stars simply because the ending left me a little unsettled. I wanted to KNOW. I realize that this is pretty much the only way to end this book but still, I really was hoping for a small hint as to what was that creature, exactly? In the end, I think this is a wonderful read.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta) Amazon.com:
3.7 out of 5 stars (23 customer reviews) 9 of 10 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Finding the Real Amidst Words,
By Eric Anderson - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: My Life As A Fake: A Novel. (Hardcover)
Following from Carey's hugely successful True History of the Kelly Gang, the author plucks another charismatic figure from history to reform in his fiction. This time he has taken the Ern Malley hoax and rewritten it using a bounty of sumptuous detail. In the 1940s a couple of writers sought to play a joke on the surrealist movement of the time. Their hoax got out of hand. They composed poetry using a mixture of their own original work, Shakespeare, a rhyming dictionary and a US army report. However, it was taken seriously, published and then caused a scandal because the content of the work was considered indecent. In many ways the editor who first received the work considered that the fake poet really did come to life. Stemming from this thought, Carey creates the story of Christopher Chubb who similarly sets up a literary hoax. This time, the fictional poet really does come to life. The narrator of My Life is a Fake is the English poetry editor Sarah Wode-Douglass. She travels to Kuala Lumpur on the invitation of her acquaintance, the poet John Slater, with whom she has a long and complicated past. By accident she meets Chubb who is working in a bicycle repair shop. He gives her a glimpse of a poem by the poet he created named McCorkle. Sarah is desperate to retrieve this poet's work to make her own claim to fame. However, first she must hear the whole gruesome story behind it. It is a complicated affair leading Sarah and the reader to wonder what is real and what is fake. McCorkle comes to life and discredits Chubb's own life. Not only is Chubb's past revealed, but through conversations Slater Sarah's own past is examined. Another fake is revealed. Carey does a magnificent job at evoking the environment of Kuala Lumpur in this time period. He creates a thrilling story despite its complicated plot. As the story progresses it becomes confusing who exactly is narrating the story. This fight to be heard seems to be the point because the spotlight is the object of desire for which the characters' manic ambition is set. Lies are the fuel used to gain entry into it. Each character struggles to make their lies sound the most convincing. It is the reader's delightful job to sift through for the truth. 8 of 10 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
A compelling novel,
By HORAK - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: My Life As A Fake: A Novel. (Hardcover)
Sarah Elizabeth Jane is an editor with "The Modern Review". When her friend the novelist John Slater suggests that she joins him on a trip to Kuala Lumpur, Sarah does not know the maze she is about to enter, "from which, thirteen years later, I haven't yet escaped" as she puts it. Shortly after their arrival in Kuala Lumpur, Sarah makes the acquaintance of an Australian in a shabby bicycle repair shop in Jalan Campbell, a man called Christopher Chubb. She soon finds out that he is the villain in the McCorkle Hoax dating back to 1946. Chubb gave birth to a phantom poet called "Bob McCorkle" who never existed but whom the Australian gave a life, a death and a biography. He then delivered a collection of poems called "Personae" to editor David Weiss, a man profoundly detested by Chubb since their common schooldays at Forest Street. Sarah is speechless as Chubb mockingly recites a passage from a poem called "Swamps": "Areas of stagnant water serve / As breeding grounds...", a passage Chubb had copied from an army manual of mosquito eradication! When Weiss published "Personae", he was arrested and prosecuted for "obscenity". As Sarah listens to the beginning of Chubb's account of his life, she is drawn into his harrowing narration. Chubb has a kind of magnetic effect on her and she can't resist wanting to learn more about Chubb's past, a maze of events on the verge of credibility. A beautifully crafted piece of storytelling, a powerful work of fiction, Mr Carey's narrative is fast, furious and haunting.
7 of 9 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Murder, Mayhem and a Literary Hoax!,
By H. F. Corbin "Foster Corbin" - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: My Life As A Fake: A Novel. (Hardcover)
Mr. Carey spins quite a yarn here. Sarah Wode-Douglas, the editor of a poetry magazine in London, travels to Malaysia with one John Slater a writer a little like Truman Capote without the mincing-- that is, he is more famous for being a famous writer than for writing--a man she thinks had an affair with her mother and is responsible for her death. There they meet a Christopher Chubb, an aging Australian. Chubb tells a story that has shades of ALICE IN WONDERLAND, Joseph's HEART OF DARKNESS, Coleridge's "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" and is as convoluted as The DA VINCI CODE.Central to the story is a literary hoax based on an incident that actually took place in Australia, according to the Author's Note at the end of this fairly short novel. (266 pages)You may not care a whit about poetry, pretentious intellectuals or literary hoaxes; on the other hand, you will race through this novel with the speed you read any first rate mystery. I had no abiding love for any of these characters but was fascinated by this great tale. Mr. Carey is nothing is not a master of the language, should I say Australian. There are nice Australian touches: "he said he would give me a hiding if I did not get off his irises straight away" and "I therefore was forced to take shank's pony to the city but I am used to walking. . ." Surely Carey is saying something about literary criticism, which can be one of the world's most pretentious endeavors. There is the question of what is real and what isn't and how significant is poetry after all? Sarah, the first person narrator, opines that there is no value that can be put on fine poetry: ". . . but what price would I put on a Shakespeare sonnet? How much for Milton, Donne, Coleridge, Yeats?" W. H. Auden, whom Slater knew, is quoted in the novel. I remember, however, that Auden said that "poetry makes nothing happen." Hey, I don't believe you have to be an English major to like this novel. Query: since Mr. Carey now lives in New York City, do we get to claim him as an American writer? I recall that he wrote a very beautiful and moving piece after September 11, 2001 about "feeling" like an American. |
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