- Paperback: 224 pages
- Publisher: Pan (Jan 29 2001)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0330246674
- ISBN-13: 978-0330246675
- Product Dimensions: 17.5 x 10.9 x 1.8 cm
- Shipping Weight: 136 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #1,221,391 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
Book Description
Porterhouse College, renowned for its gastronomic excellence, the arrogance of its Fellows, and its academic mediocrity, has a new Master. Determined to change all this, he finds a most intransigent foe in Skullion, the Head Porter.
--This text refers to an alternate
Paperback
edition.
From the Inside Flap
The basis of a PBS miniseries, Porterhouse Blues confirms that Tom Sharpe is "an excellent writer and absolutely hilarious. His characterizations are deft, his plots are brilliant, and his prose style is smooth and winning" (P.J. O'Rourke).
To Porterhouse College-bastion of a formidable crew team, lavish dining hall and wine cellar, and laughable academic standards-comes a crusading new Master. Porterhouse alumni believe in manly sports, the royal family, and brandy in the library with a fervor they bring to few intellectual positions. And the college upholds a long tradition of granting degrees to a certain number of muttonheaded young gentlemen of enviable pedigree and adequate family contribution to the school's treasury.
The new Master, afire with liberal zeal, upsets everyone's digestion with a speech outlining plans to do things that simply aren't done: the admission of women, a cafeteria to replace the revered service of the kitchens, and contraceptive dispensers in every bathroom. The shock of the new and modern rattles even the college retainers. The head porter, Skullion, perhaps the staunchest supporter of the old way, rallies some powerful graduates to the cause, including the illustrious Canon Bowel and the madly wealthy-and plain mad-Sir Cathcart D'Eath. Their counterrevolutionary efforts result, among other peculiar events, in the most bizarre disaster seen at Cambridge in five hundred years, and in an escalation of threats, bluffs, and maneuvers to shame the shadiest of politicians. And the production of an investigative documentary on the strange doings at Porterhouse precipitates scandal of the highest order and an utterly unforeseeable conclusion.
"Terrific. It is light years since I read anything so original."--P.G. Wodehouse
"The funniest writer in English today."--The Washington Post Book World
Tom Sharpe was born in England in 1928 and educated at Cambridge. He emigrated to South Africa in 1951, but was deported in 1961. From 1963 to 1972 he was a lecturer in history at the Cambridge College of Arts and Technology. He is the author of eight other novels and two non-fiction books, Riotous Assembly and Indecent Exposure, about South Africa. He is married and lives in Cambridge. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.
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Most helpful customer reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars
The humour is academic.,
This review is from: Porterhouse Blue (Paperback)
A satirical leg-pull on one of Britains most august institutions, the Oxbridge College. All the pomp is there, the swan stuffed with widgeon, ageing dons clinging to their chairs with dead cold hands, gate porters who have more in common with east european secret police than with door men.Within this stuffy and pompous world Sharpe sets a hilarious story. Gas filled condoms bobbing on the lawn, exploding chimneys, numerous haircuts on the one day. All the elements of a good farce are brought together to give a really good funny read. Not the funniest Sharpe novel, but definitely on form.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Rip Roaring Fun...Hilarious Academic Farce,
By
This review is from: Porterhouse Blue (Paperback)
There's an out loud laugh a minute in this university life farce. The old verses the new, tradition and progress, black humor and farce abound..Some eccentric characters even by Brit standards, and written so well you'll breeze right through it! Also great descriptions, and you'll feel you're a casual witness to the academic shenanigans all the way through. My only criticism is some very serious situations (like a murderous fire) may be taken a bit too casually..Still, with a touch of class and bawdiness, this one is a real winner!
4.0 out of 5 stars
Very funny, but somewhat inaccessible,
By "corwalch" (Philadelphia, PA United States) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Porterhouse Blue (Paperback)
Of all Tom Sharpe's novels, _Porterhouse Blue_ is perhaps the least accessible. It helps to know something of Cambridge, Peterhouse in particular. Hugh Trevor-Roper, Lady Alexandra, Brian Wormald, and others make barely disguised appearances. Likewise does it help to know something of the Cambridge tripos system and the actual role of the colleges in undergraduate life. Helps to know something, that is, but not too much, as "true insiders" have told me it barely scratches the surface. Overall, funny and viciously satirical, but not Tom Sharpe at his best.
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