Publication
Picador (2015), 240 p.
Original publication date
1996
Collections
Genres
Subjects
Awards
Dublin Literary Award (Longlist — 1998)
Costa Book Awards (Shortlist — First Novel — 1996)
LA Times Book Prize (Finalist — 1996)
Betty Trask Prize and Awards (Prize Winner — Winner — 1996)
Hawthornden Prize (1997)
Description
Tarquin Winot, voluptuary, super-civilized ironist and snob, sets out on a journey of the senses from the Hotel Splendide, Portsmouth, to his cottage in Provence, his spiritual home.With his head newly shaved and his well-thumbed copy of the Mossad Manual of Surveillance Techniques safely stowed, Tarquin elegantly introduces his life, itself a work of art, through the medium of seasonal menus.Poisonously funny and opinionated, Tarquin graces us with accounts of his unjustly celebrated sculptor sibling, his beloved Irish nanny, his adoring parents, their alcoholic Norwegian cook, as well as Tarquin's neighbours in France; and the series of unfortunate accidents that they have unaccountably met with...
User reviews
LibraryThing member sturlington
The Debt to Pleasure is one of my favorite “dark” novels. Ostensibly a narrative cookbook, this novel quickly metamorphoses into a rambling memoir that jumps, seemingly randomly, from one event to another in the unnamed narrator’s life. Bit by bit, piece by piece, the reader begins to realize
I don’t want to give away any more than that and spoil the fun of unraveling this twisted tale. But I will say that the character of the narrator is one of the most fully realized, completely insane characters I’ve ever encountered in fiction, and in reading the novel, we fully inhabit his strange mind. Indeed, because he is telling us his story, and because he is so full of self-delusions, the only way we can get to the truth is through the little hints he drops, the occasional omissions in his tales, the gradual realization that he is deceiving us and the other characters see him very differently than he portrays himself.
This book is both a work of genius and loads of fun – subtle, dark and delicious. And if you’re at all interested in food or cooking – as any civilized person must be – there are many interesting rambles on those subjects, as well.
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that something is very wrong here.I don’t want to give away any more than that and spoil the fun of unraveling this twisted tale. But I will say that the character of the narrator is one of the most fully realized, completely insane characters I’ve ever encountered in fiction, and in reading the novel, we fully inhabit his strange mind. Indeed, because he is telling us his story, and because he is so full of self-delusions, the only way we can get to the truth is through the little hints he drops, the occasional omissions in his tales, the gradual realization that he is deceiving us and the other characters see him very differently than he portrays himself.
This book is both a work of genius and loads of fun – subtle, dark and delicious. And if you’re at all interested in food or cooking – as any civilized person must be – there are many interesting rambles on those subjects, as well.
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LibraryThing member ChiaraBeth
Delicious. There is no better adjective to describe this book. It is simply a delicious, scrumptious, and teasingly delectable read. And the fun part? It's not really about the food. But I won't say anything more to ruin it for you. Know only that Lanchester writes with an acute and cutting wit, a
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diabolical intelligence, and the darkest of humors I've yet to read in a novel. Whatever you might think of the first person narrator by the end of the book, I'll bet you'll wish you knew him as much as I did. Show Less
LibraryThing member Wattson
A totally new experience - intriguing, dark, hilarious: the slow unfolding of a true monster. And essential kitchen tips as well.
LibraryThing member Eyejaybee
This is a dazzling book, and all the more impressive in that it was John Lanchester’s first novel, although he had already established himself as a respected journalist and columnist. Beautifully written, it defies ready classification, hovering between high class cookbook, murder mystery and
Self-appointed (indeed, self-anointed) aesthete Tarquin Winot regales his readers with mouth-watering descriptions of seasonal dishes while recounting various episodes from his life. It is only as the novel progresses that the reader comes to recognise that an unusually high proportion of Winot’s family, entourage and acquaintances seem to have met untimely and sudden deaths.
As we join Winot, he is embarking on a journey from Portsmouth to Provence where he arranges a "chance" encounter with a journalist who is attempting to write a biography of Winot's elder and more celebrated brother Bartholomew (more generally referred to as "Barry"), who has become an established artist and sculptor. Engineering this seemingly fortuitous encounter is fairly easy for Winot, as we come to learn that one of his favourite books, and one which accompanies him wherever he goes, is the "Mossad Guide to Secret Surveillance".
Tarquin has nothing but disdain for the unstructured output of his brother, or his all too proletarian habits, and does what he can to disillusion the biographer. While doing so, we see beautiful glimpses of Winot’s relatively opulent childhood, although even early on there are signs of deeply-rooted dysfunction. Winot’s descriptions of the meals that he recommends at different seasons, and his appreciations of the countryside through which he travels, are perfectly sumptuous.
In Tarquin Winot, John Lanchester has created a grotesque, yet oddly enticing, character, , and the book is a joy to read (or, is in the current case, re-read with heightened – and not disappointed – anticipation).
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espionage handbook.Self-appointed (indeed, self-anointed) aesthete Tarquin Winot regales his readers with mouth-watering descriptions of seasonal dishes while recounting various episodes from his life. It is only as the novel progresses that the reader comes to recognise that an unusually high proportion of Winot’s family, entourage and acquaintances seem to have met untimely and sudden deaths.
As we join Winot, he is embarking on a journey from Portsmouth to Provence where he arranges a "chance" encounter with a journalist who is attempting to write a biography of Winot's elder and more celebrated brother Bartholomew (more generally referred to as "Barry"), who has become an established artist and sculptor. Engineering this seemingly fortuitous encounter is fairly easy for Winot, as we come to learn that one of his favourite books, and one which accompanies him wherever he goes, is the "Mossad Guide to Secret Surveillance".
Tarquin has nothing but disdain for the unstructured output of his brother, or his all too proletarian habits, and does what he can to disillusion the biographer. While doing so, we see beautiful glimpses of Winot’s relatively opulent childhood, although even early on there are signs of deeply-rooted dysfunction. Winot’s descriptions of the meals that he recommends at different seasons, and his appreciations of the countryside through which he travels, are perfectly sumptuous.
In Tarquin Winot, John Lanchester has created a grotesque, yet oddly enticing, character, , and the book is a joy to read (or, is in the current case, re-read with heightened – and not disappointed – anticipation).
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LibraryThing member jacoombs
A surprising pastiche that seems oddly out of its time. Would easily be a five-star for its wit and inventiveness if it didn't ocassionally go over the top (no doubt intentional given the eccentricity of the narrator).
LibraryThing member LisaLynne
This starts a little slow. A man who is obviously very, very full of himself, expounding on his particular fascinations about food and drink. He has a singular point of view and doesn't allow for much deviation. I found his food snobbery hilarious, although I would not have wanted to share a table
As the story progresses, there is a sense that something is going on just under the surface. Perhaps I'm slow on the uptake, but I was 3/4 of the way through the book before I realized just what was going on - and the ending took me completely by surprise! Great fun.
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with him...especially considering what is to come.As the story progresses, there is a sense that something is going on just under the surface. Perhaps I'm slow on the uptake, but I was 3/4 of the way through the book before I realized just what was going on - and the ending took me completely by surprise! Great fun.
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LibraryThing member Julia_Chanteray
I'm re-reading this book after a gap of several years. I'm enjoying the intensely verbose narrator, even though he's repugnant in many ways, for his misanthropy, right wing views, conservatism, and of course my (dawning) recollection that the book doesn't have a happy ending.
It takes a little
It takes a little
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bearing with to allow the book to get under your skin, but it's having an effect as I've spent the evening eating tasty cheese and drinking a rather fine Pinot Gris, in the manner of the (anti) hero of the book. I promise not to murder anyone tomorrow, even if they annoy me... Show Less
LibraryThing member Editormum
"I had in mind a project for a novel which would begin in the usual manner ... except that gradually the characters' identities would begin to slip and to blur, and so would the geographical surroundings. ...Only the style of the book would remain consistent .... gradually ... the work would become
It is not often that an author postpones his statement of purpose to the closing pages of his work, burying it within the work itself, rather than in a preface, foreword, or note from the author. But that is precisely what John Lanchester has done in this novel.
Habitual preface-skippers will miss out on essential information, as the "preface" is a note from the protagonist, not from the author. And it sets the stage for the tone of the rest of the book.
Tarquin Winot is the anti-heroic protagonist of this book -- he is, in fact, so anti-heroic that he serves as both protagonist and antagonist. Winot is verbose, opinionated, patronizing, self-aggrandizing, and quite too fond of himself. He is also faintly sinister, but the faintness of that impression steadily diminishes throughout the narrative.
(If you can call it that. If James Joyce or TS Eliot were to write a murder-mystery, this book is a good example of what would result. It's a stream-of-consciousness, flashback-ridden nightmare of a story.)
Winot is presented as a gourmet and conoisseur -- but not in a sympathetic way. He is a dark and worrying figure, and the disjointed stories of his earlier life increase the darkness and worry. What begins to emerge is a person whose life has been strangely surrounded by bizarre and inexplicable tragedies. And a person who seems to have both a morbid fascination with death and a suspicious knowledge of the intimate details of the tragedies that touch his life.
This is a hard book to read, and it was only sheer, teeth-gritting determination that got me through the first two chapters. And then I couldn't stop reading, even though I wanted to. I needed to understand what was being hinted at. I needed to know the end, even though it was all-too-baldly foreshadowed. If you can work your way through the page-long periodic sentences with their frequent interruptions and asides, you will, as the author suggests, find yourself waking from "a deep and violent dream," afflicted by "incurable unease."
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more troubling ... until the appalled readers, unable to understand what was happening ... and also unable to stop reading, would watch the wholesale metastasization ... the collapse ... so that when they finally put the book down they are aware only of having been protagonists in a deep and violent dream whose sole purpose is their incurable unease." (pages 226-228)It is not often that an author postpones his statement of purpose to the closing pages of his work, burying it within the work itself, rather than in a preface, foreword, or note from the author. But that is precisely what John Lanchester has done in this novel.
Habitual preface-skippers will miss out on essential information, as the "preface" is a note from the protagonist, not from the author. And it sets the stage for the tone of the rest of the book.
Tarquin Winot is the anti-heroic protagonist of this book -- he is, in fact, so anti-heroic that he serves as both protagonist and antagonist. Winot is verbose, opinionated, patronizing, self-aggrandizing, and quite too fond of himself. He is also faintly sinister, but the faintness of that impression steadily diminishes throughout the narrative.
(If you can call it that. If James Joyce or TS Eliot were to write a murder-mystery, this book is a good example of what would result. It's a stream-of-consciousness, flashback-ridden nightmare of a story.)
Winot is presented as a gourmet and conoisseur -- but not in a sympathetic way. He is a dark and worrying figure, and the disjointed stories of his earlier life increase the darkness and worry. What begins to emerge is a person whose life has been strangely surrounded by bizarre and inexplicable tragedies. And a person who seems to have both a morbid fascination with death and a suspicious knowledge of the intimate details of the tragedies that touch his life.
This is a hard book to read, and it was only sheer, teeth-gritting determination that got me through the first two chapters. And then I couldn't stop reading, even though I wanted to. I needed to understand what was being hinted at. I needed to know the end, even though it was all-too-baldly foreshadowed. If you can work your way through the page-long periodic sentences with their frequent interruptions and asides, you will, as the author suggests, find yourself waking from "a deep and violent dream," afflicted by "incurable unease."
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LibraryThing member sunfi
Tried this one but I couldn't get into it. It was a foodie book and normally I enjoy these but I had trouble staying interested. The story of the narrator's life is told through a series of seasonal menus, not just talking about the final dishes but also about the ingredients that go into each dish
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and the way it is prepared. I gave the book over 50 pages but the story never "caught me". Show Less
LibraryThing member pandammonia
Whilst taking me quite a while to get into it, i thoroughly enjoyed this book, especially more toward the end.
A fictional memoir written as a seasonal menu, relating his life to certain recipes. A fantastic use of the English language, it had me picking up my dictionary quite a few times. Also, a
A gastronomical feat of literary genius.
A fictional memoir written as a seasonal menu, relating his life to certain recipes. A fantastic use of the English language, it had me picking up my dictionary quite a few times. Also, a
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lot of cooking terms i was unfamiliar with, and i did have to polish up my french as well.A gastronomical feat of literary genius.
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LibraryThing member Eyejaybee
A dazzling debut that hovers between cookbook, murder mystery and espionage handbook!
Self-anointed aesthete Tarquin Winot regales his readers with mouth-watering descriptions of seasonal dishes while recounting various episodes from his life during which a substantial number of people seem to have
As we join Winot he is embarking on a journey from Portsmouth to Provence where he arranges a "chance" encounter with a journalist who is attempting to write a biography of Winot's elder and more celebrated brother Bartholomew (more generally referred to as "Barry") who has become an established artist and sculptor. Engineering this encounter is fairly easy for Winot as one of his favourite books, and one which accompanies him wherever he goes, is the "Mossad Guide to Secret Surveillance".
Tarquin has nothing but disdain for the unstructured output of his brother, or his all too proletarian habits, and does what he can to disillusion the biographer.
The descriptions of the food, and the countryside, and the glimpses we are offered of Winot's opulent childhood are perfectly sumptuous, and the book is a joy to read.
Self-anointed aesthete Tarquin Winot regales his readers with mouth-watering descriptions of seasonal dishes while recounting various episodes from his life during which a substantial number of people seem to have
Show More
met untimely and sudden deaths.As we join Winot he is embarking on a journey from Portsmouth to Provence where he arranges a "chance" encounter with a journalist who is attempting to write a biography of Winot's elder and more celebrated brother Bartholomew (more generally referred to as "Barry") who has become an established artist and sculptor. Engineering this encounter is fairly easy for Winot as one of his favourite books, and one which accompanies him wherever he goes, is the "Mossad Guide to Secret Surveillance".
Tarquin has nothing but disdain for the unstructured output of his brother, or his all too proletarian habits, and does what he can to disillusion the biographer.
The descriptions of the food, and the countryside, and the glimpses we are offered of Winot's opulent childhood are perfectly sumptuous, and the book is a joy to read.
Show Less
LibraryThing member mattviews
Do you know that word "barbecue" originates from Haitian "barbacado" that refers to a rack-frame system leaving off the ground a bed? Do you know that tomatoes, if imminently picked and allowed to ripe during transport, will turn plasticky and insipid? Do you know that the thickness requirement in
John Lanchester's The Debt of Pleasure not only deftly answers all the above questions but also, in impeccable and painfully beguiling prose, embraces his readers into the world of Tarquin Winot. Strictly speaking, the book, which is nothing more than a scrumptious culinary reflection in thoughtful menus arranged by the seasons, cannot be deemed as a work of fiction if Winot is a real chef. From his menus, which embody different cultures, capture a man's psychology and thus his impulse to order, and witness the come-and-go of dining trends; Winot related the story of his life to the preparations of food.
The writing is as insatiating and titillating as the menus. Winot retreated to southern France and reminisced, papered his thoughts on the subject of food that evoked his childhood, his parents, his brother Barthomelow the artist, the beloved maidservant Mary-Theresa, and the home cook Mitthaug. Aroma of a particular dish could graciously tug his memory and coalesce the disparate locations of Winot's upbringing. Woven into his painfully and haughtily opinionated meditations on food was disheartening anecdotes of his family. His brother struggled as an artist who, like other artists in history, never felt adequately attended to for his work and died a tragic death of fungus poisoning. His parents, in a multiplying series of mishaps that primarily involved leaving all the kitchen gas taps on and a full-scale leak from the gas boiler, died in an explosion triggered by turning on a light switch.
The lighter side of the book tells of Winot's aspiration to becoming a chef. He attributed such biographical significance to a chance visit to his brother's boarding school in England. The food served was a nightmarish demonstration of culinary banality and a stark confirmation of Captain Ford's quote in 1846 "The salad is the glory of every French dinner and the disgrace of most in England." A more humorous side would be Winot's rash denunciation of sweet-and-sour dishes (lupsup, meaning garbage) that dominated the English dining. As a native of Hong Kong, the notion truly hit home as any violent combination such as the sweet-and-sour taste is immediately deemed as inauthentic.
Read it as a novel "masquerading" as a cookbook, as a memoir, as food critics, as secretive cooking knacks, as word of caution (such as the roasting of apple seeds will release toxins), as an indispensable companion to your conventional cookbook, an eccentric philosophical soliloquy of the culinary art. I vouch that anyone who reads this book will find the recipes zestfully flirting with the tastebuds and liberating the senses. Exquisitely written.
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preserving the juice in barbecued meat is an inch to 3 inches? Have you ever wondered why starch (such as rice) and fruits, and not a glass of iced water, serve to subdue the spiciness of curry?John Lanchester's The Debt of Pleasure not only deftly answers all the above questions but also, in impeccable and painfully beguiling prose, embraces his readers into the world of Tarquin Winot. Strictly speaking, the book, which is nothing more than a scrumptious culinary reflection in thoughtful menus arranged by the seasons, cannot be deemed as a work of fiction if Winot is a real chef. From his menus, which embody different cultures, capture a man's psychology and thus his impulse to order, and witness the come-and-go of dining trends; Winot related the story of his life to the preparations of food.
The writing is as insatiating and titillating as the menus. Winot retreated to southern France and reminisced, papered his thoughts on the subject of food that evoked his childhood, his parents, his brother Barthomelow the artist, the beloved maidservant Mary-Theresa, and the home cook Mitthaug. Aroma of a particular dish could graciously tug his memory and coalesce the disparate locations of Winot's upbringing. Woven into his painfully and haughtily opinionated meditations on food was disheartening anecdotes of his family. His brother struggled as an artist who, like other artists in history, never felt adequately attended to for his work and died a tragic death of fungus poisoning. His parents, in a multiplying series of mishaps that primarily involved leaving all the kitchen gas taps on and a full-scale leak from the gas boiler, died in an explosion triggered by turning on a light switch.
The lighter side of the book tells of Winot's aspiration to becoming a chef. He attributed such biographical significance to a chance visit to his brother's boarding school in England. The food served was a nightmarish demonstration of culinary banality and a stark confirmation of Captain Ford's quote in 1846 "The salad is the glory of every French dinner and the disgrace of most in England." A more humorous side would be Winot's rash denunciation of sweet-and-sour dishes (lupsup, meaning garbage) that dominated the English dining. As a native of Hong Kong, the notion truly hit home as any violent combination such as the sweet-and-sour taste is immediately deemed as inauthentic.
Read it as a novel "masquerading" as a cookbook, as a memoir, as food critics, as secretive cooking knacks, as word of caution (such as the roasting of apple seeds will release toxins), as an indispensable companion to your conventional cookbook, an eccentric philosophical soliloquy of the culinary art. I vouch that anyone who reads this book will find the recipes zestfully flirting with the tastebuds and liberating the senses. Exquisitely written.
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LibraryThing member mkbird
Did not like this...
LibraryThing member Glorybe1
Very very wordy, long winded and meandering. quite witty I suppose but far too abstract for my tastes.
LibraryThing member sine_nomine
I loved this "food for thought" book.
LibraryThing member bodachliath
This is a very enjoyable, funny and impressive book, the "gastro-historico-psycho-autobiographico-anthropico-philosophic lucubrations" of the gourmand Tarquin Winot, starting as a discussion of food, cookery and its history before moving almost imperceptibly into darker territory.
LibraryThing member HerrRau
Not just quite the book for me. The narrator is as wordy as Humbert Humbert, but much less charming or interesting, and cares desparately what people think of him. It's just not much fun listening to him. But yes, I like strong narrators, and food, surprises, and crime, so it was fun enough, in its
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way. Show Less
LibraryThing member JimElkins
Delicious, scrumptious, edible, entertaining, delightful, effervescent, droll, luscious, diverting, appetizing, floral
This book is all of these and many others, relentlessly and endlessly. I am not the intended reader: it's impossible not to be amused and instructed, but for me it's also impossible
This book is all of these and many others, relentlessly and endlessly. I am not the intended reader: it's impossible not to be amused and instructed, but for me it's also impossible
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to be happy when an author is so tirelessly trying to be of impeccable seamless delicately balanced good cheer. I imagine if I was prone to sudden dizzying dips in general happiness, I would find this a balm, but I would only feel good while I was reading. the moment I stopped I'd be unhappy again. Just like it is with any diversion. A novel, I think, needs to want to do more: at the very least its author has to want, every once in a while, for more than just half a sentence at a time, to make the reader unhappy. Show Less
LibraryThing member maryhollis
THE DEBT TO PLEASURE is a gastronomic journey that meanders from how to create a perfect menu to a number of eclectic topics, including the life story of the narrator, Tarquin Winot. Tarquin is a cultured, knowledgeable, rather pompous, yet charming food writer who regales the reader with his
"....one feels the need to pick and choose, to intrigue the palate with a variety of treats and excellences rather than to confront the appetite head-on, as in a gladitorial contest between the retiarius and the murmillo, the net-swinger with the cruel trident and the heavily armored myrmidon----this having been the clash that especially excited my youthful imagination, much more so than the boringly one-sided encounter betweeen lions and Christians( a form of public execution which I notice fails to be mentioned by penal theorists discussing the rival merits of lethal injection versus firing squad versus electric chair)."
However, I slowly began to realize that behind this rather puffed-up ego laid a dark and sinister creature. Tarquin Winot is, as one reviewer so aptly put it, " barking mad".
John Lancaster's THE DEBT TO PLEASURE exhibits a Nabokovian sense of plot, characterization, and choice of words. His brilliant wit makes this book a small masterpiece.
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expert opinions on such subjects as the ideal Irish Stew to the ambiance of good restaurant to the erotics of dislike. His outre obsevations are wickedly funny and I found myself laughing so hard that I had to re-read many passages. "....one feels the need to pick and choose, to intrigue the palate with a variety of treats and excellences rather than to confront the appetite head-on, as in a gladitorial contest between the retiarius and the murmillo, the net-swinger with the cruel trident and the heavily armored myrmidon----this having been the clash that especially excited my youthful imagination, much more so than the boringly one-sided encounter betweeen lions and Christians( a form of public execution which I notice fails to be mentioned by penal theorists discussing the rival merits of lethal injection versus firing squad versus electric chair)."
However, I slowly began to realize that behind this rather puffed-up ego laid a dark and sinister creature. Tarquin Winot is, as one reviewer so aptly put it, " barking mad".
John Lancaster's THE DEBT TO PLEASURE exhibits a Nabokovian sense of plot, characterization, and choice of words. His brilliant wit makes this book a small masterpiece.
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LibraryThing member thorold
A first novel by a literary journalist, which looks suspiciously as though it was written in response to a drunken challenge to incorporate the essential elements of as many stereotypical British bestsellers as possible into a single story. Cookery with recipes and menus, middle-class English
I'm not much of a foodie, so I suspect I missed some of the more subtle jokes, but this is obviously meant as a parody of those novels where you get a recipe in every chapter: our helpful narrator Tarquin never quite gets all the way through the essential details of a recipe before being distracted into telling us about something else, and you would probably get into a terrible mess if you were so silly as to try to reproduce any of his menus.
When it first appeared, this would have been an ideal Christmas present for those pretentious friends or relatives who are always going on about their cottage in France and the little restaurants they have "discovered" there. By now they've probably read it already, unfortunately, and they are more worried about Brexit and their 90 days than about aubergines or cheeses, but it's still good fun for a couple of hours.
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people in rural France, artists, romance, servants, boarding-school, cottages in Norfolk, social snobbery, food snobbery, and — oh yes, I nearly forgot — a body-count that would put Midsomer to shame. All ruthlessly sent up via an appalling, unreliable narrator, very clever and often wickedly funny. The only thing Lanchester seems to have forgotten is that a novel like this should have a clergyman in it somewhere. Purists might also be disappointed to find that there's only one small scene of canine interest.I'm not much of a foodie, so I suspect I missed some of the more subtle jokes, but this is obviously meant as a parody of those novels where you get a recipe in every chapter: our helpful narrator Tarquin never quite gets all the way through the essential details of a recipe before being distracted into telling us about something else, and you would probably get into a terrible mess if you were so silly as to try to reproduce any of his menus.
When it first appeared, this would have been an ideal Christmas present for those pretentious friends or relatives who are always going on about their cottage in France and the little restaurants they have "discovered" there. By now they've probably read it already, unfortunately, and they are more worried about Brexit and their 90 days than about aubergines or cheeses, but it's still good fun for a couple of hours.
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LibraryThing member starbox
The false friend has a more general applicability and usefulness than in the purely grammatical sphere.Not least in family life',
Narrated by one Tarquin Winot, a snobbish yet brilliant foodie, as he travels to his home in France, this might seem at first to be nothing more than his musings (and
'I myself have always disliked being called a 'genius'. It is fascinating to notice how quick people have been to intuit this aversion and avoid using the term."
I was hooked from the first chapter where Tarquin so brilliantly recalls taking lunch at his brother's boarding school (which 'my father described as"'towards the top of the second division" ').
As we follow Tarquin, his thoughts on life (some brilliant, some quite mad), his recollections of childhood - parents, artist brother and servants - and much more, we start to see a lot more to him than was at first apparent...
Truly brilliant writing, Lanchester never lets Tarquin's personality for a moment. Like nothing you've ever read - well, maybe our narrator, Tarquin, has a passing (but sinister) resemblance in his pomposity to Ignatius in 'Confederacy of Dunce
Narrated by one Tarquin Winot, a snobbish yet brilliant foodie, as he travels to his home in France, this might seem at first to be nothing more than his musings (and
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highly entertaining these are) punctuated by recipes. But the reader soon observes a megalomania in Tarquin:'I myself have always disliked being called a 'genius'. It is fascinating to notice how quick people have been to intuit this aversion and avoid using the term."
I was hooked from the first chapter where Tarquin so brilliantly recalls taking lunch at his brother's boarding school (which 'my father described as"'towards the top of the second division" ').
As we follow Tarquin, his thoughts on life (some brilliant, some quite mad), his recollections of childhood - parents, artist brother and servants - and much more, we start to see a lot more to him than was at first apparent...
Truly brilliant writing, Lanchester never lets Tarquin's personality for a moment. Like nothing you've ever read - well, maybe our narrator, Tarquin, has a passing (but sinister) resemblance in his pomposity to Ignatius in 'Confederacy of Dunce
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LibraryThing member John
It is a remarkable first novel about a man who is the epitome of good taste, refinement, sensitivity to the cross-links between and among cultures in language, customs, and especially cooking, being himself a gourmet cook with an encyclopedic knowledge of food ingredients, their histories and their
The gleaming banks of seafood on display at the great Parisian brasseries are like certain politicians in that they manage to be impressive without necessarily inspiring absolute confidence.
The process of ripening in cheese is a little like the human acquisition of wisdom and maturity: both processes involve a recognition, or incorporation, of the fact that life is an incurable disease with a hundred percent mortality rate-- slow variety of death.
And in one revealing passage, the author sums up the attitude and approach of the protagonist:
the Loire...is France's least obvious and therefore most compelling wine river, and the fact that is unnavigatable--too shallow and too treacherous to be a means of transportation--it is beautifully unsullied by any human presence...and therefore the Loire is a mirror or metaphor of the human psyche--treacherous, unnavigable, resistant to banal ideas of use, its superficial calm masking unconvenanted depths, hidden velocities.
This describes well the protagonist, Tarquin Winot, who in addition to the characteristics noted above, and who takes the reader through a wonderful exploration of food and recipes, is a murderer. He has either instigated suicide (by framing a favourite servant), or outright murdered people, with considerable forethought and planning, including his parents and his brother. A large part of the story, although it takes a while to emerge, is that Winot is stalking a couple; she is supposed to be his biographer, and when he has them as guests at his house, he feeds them poisoned mushrooms for which there is no antidote, and the effects of which take place some hours after ingestion, thus providing a wonderful alibi. The books ends: "By the time I got there the murdered couple had gone around the corner onto the main road, leaving behind them a slow cloud of settling dust". An intriguing book, very well written, and a fine exploration, almost by osmosis rather than direct exposition, of a pure sociopath. The contrast between the inner and outer worlds of Tarquin Winot could not be more striking, even though he masks the former, even to himself, in philosophic terms, for example when he expounds upon his theory and philosophy of murder and death in comparison to other forms of art.
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usages. The writing has some wonderful passages:The gleaming banks of seafood on display at the great Parisian brasseries are like certain politicians in that they manage to be impressive without necessarily inspiring absolute confidence.
The process of ripening in cheese is a little like the human acquisition of wisdom and maturity: both processes involve a recognition, or incorporation, of the fact that life is an incurable disease with a hundred percent mortality rate-- slow variety of death.
And in one revealing passage, the author sums up the attitude and approach of the protagonist:
the Loire...is France's least obvious and therefore most compelling wine river, and the fact that is unnavigatable--too shallow and too treacherous to be a means of transportation--it is beautifully unsullied by any human presence...and therefore the Loire is a mirror or metaphor of the human psyche--treacherous, unnavigable, resistant to banal ideas of use, its superficial calm masking unconvenanted depths, hidden velocities.
This describes well the protagonist, Tarquin Winot, who in addition to the characteristics noted above, and who takes the reader through a wonderful exploration of food and recipes, is a murderer. He has either instigated suicide (by framing a favourite servant), or outright murdered people, with considerable forethought and planning, including his parents and his brother. A large part of the story, although it takes a while to emerge, is that Winot is stalking a couple; she is supposed to be his biographer, and when he has them as guests at his house, he feeds them poisoned mushrooms for which there is no antidote, and the effects of which take place some hours after ingestion, thus providing a wonderful alibi. The books ends: "By the time I got there the murdered couple had gone around the corner onto the main road, leaving behind them a slow cloud of settling dust". An intriguing book, very well written, and a fine exploration, almost by osmosis rather than direct exposition, of a pure sociopath. The contrast between the inner and outer worlds of Tarquin Winot could not be more striking, even though he masks the former, even to himself, in philosophic terms, for example when he expounds upon his theory and philosophy of murder and death in comparison to other forms of art.
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LibraryThing member lisahistory
The ultimate in snarky, pompous narrators leads the reader through his own plot, liberally spiced with tempting recipes and twisty recollections of his own earlier life. The use of language, necessarily elevated with such a narrator, is a revelation, every sentence exactly as it should be.
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Brilliant. Show Less
Media reviews
Sprachlich allein ist das Werk ein Vergnügen, wenn es dem Übersetzer auch nicht gelingt, alles von dieser geschliffenen Prosa ins Deutsche hinüberzuretten. Das wahrhaft erschreckende (und mit anderen Worten: das wahrhaft meisterhafte) an diesem Buch jedoch ist die Art und Weise, in der Winot als
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Mörder und Zyniker durch und durch sympathisch erscheint: ein besserer Künstler als sein Bruder, ein besserer Koch als seine alkoholisierten Hausangestellten, geistreicheren Konversationspartner als alle seine Bekannten, stets bereit für einen ästhetisch anspruchsvollen Mord. Einen intelligenteren Bösewicht hat die Literaturgeschichte seit dem Vicomte de Valmont nicht gesehen. Und gerade deshalb: ein zutiefst moralisches, sehr modernes und vor allem höchst amüsantes Buch. Appetitlich wie ein Kugelfisch und wirksam wie das Gift in ihm. Show Less
Language
Original language
English
ISBN
1447275381 / 9781447275381
Physical description
240 p.; 7.76 inches
Pages
240