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The Hard Life


Paperback
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Subtitled "An Exegesis of Squalor," The Hard Life is a sober farce from a master of Irish comic fiction. Set in Dublin at the turn of the century, the novel does involve squalor—illness, alcoholism, unemployment, bodily functions, crime, illicit sex—but also investigates such diverse topics as Church history, tightrope walking, and the pressing need for public toilets for ladies. The Hard Life is straight-faced entertainment that conceals in laughter its own devious and wicked satire by one of the best known Irish writers of the 20th century.

Details

ISBN-10 1-56478-141-0
ISBN-13 9781564781413
Publication Date Mar 1994
Nb of pages 179
Dimensions 5.5 x 8.5 in.

Reviews

Press Reviews

Times Literary Supplement
"The dialogue is first-rate, as is the Dublin atmosphere; and some of his characters are as rich and yeasty as good porter foaming out of the jar."

Time
"Mixing wild parody with whirlwind farce, O'Brien quickly has Manus (referred to simply as 'The Brother') escape to England and there grow rich by founding a bogus correspondence academy . . . In The Brother, O'Brien has turned loose a memorably monstrous archetypal entrepreneur."

New York Herald Tribune
"Described as a 'sober farce,' this book is anything but sober. Wild, hilarious, fast moving, irreverent and comic would be the better way to describe it . . . Not since the publication of Mr. O'Brien's first book, At Swim-Two-Birds, has such a comic novel come out of Ireland."

Library Journal
"The conversation is a delight—it seems no Irishman can be dull when talking—and the atmosphere of a lower-middle-class family, with its cheerless, shabby, restricted way of life, is well done."

Atlantic
"Flann O'Brien's The Hard Life is a comic Irish novel that derives its effect from an absolutely deadpan approach, for the narrator is a small boy who, for the better part of the time, has
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City Pages
"The real subject and hero of the novel is the English language—or rather, the Irish version of English. It's possible that O'Brien is actually better than Joyce at preserving the qualities of
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Quotations

"Mr. O'Brien's almost callous economy of language, combined with an odd moral sensitivity, renders beastliness truly beastly but also completely funny."
-Simon Raven

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Genres : Fiction : Europe : British and Irish
Countries : Ireland


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