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Either way, it works. Jul 28, Heidi rated it really liked it. It mirrors his mind. I was several dozen pages in before I latched.
And then I surprised myself by ultimately loving this book and the sleuth work it demanded. I loved Larry, and the satisfaction of knowing his heart before he did. I loved his people, infuriating as some of them could be. Persevere with me in this circuitous path, Shields seems to say. I was given this book when it first came out in After reading the first few pages, I put it back on the shelf.
There it sat for 17 years with a bookmark at page I'm so glad I came back to it. At this stage in my life I am so much more receptive to Larry's life lessons! I think the reason I didn't like it at that time was that I had read The Stone Diaries and was expecting something similar. I've learned not to do that. An author's books should be like his or her children. They should e I was given this book when it first came out in They should each contain a part of them but they should also be different.
Larry Wellar is a normal, average guy living a mundane life just like so many of us. Carol Shields has taken this ordinary man's existance and given it meaning. It gives us hope, doesn't it, that no matter how simple our lives may seem, they truly have a meaningful place in the realm of human existence. The book is laid out in chapters focusing on specific years in Larry's adult life from when he was 26 years old to There is a lot of reiteration of key elements about Larry from chapter to chapter.
At first I found this redundant and annoying but then it occurred to me that we all do that. Repeat little parts of our bio to others and to ourselves; our occupation, where we live, our relationships, interests. These details define us as unique beings. It reinforces who we really are. Even our names, as was the focus of one chapter, has an effect on how others percieve us and how we perceive ourselves. It's Larryness has always seemed an imprisonment and a sly wink toward its most conspicuous rhyme: He was just one more citizen of the Larry nation, those barbecuers, those volunteer firemen, those wearers of muscle shirts He feels "the unexpected rapture of being blindly led" and "the futility of " pushing throught he tunnel of an ever-receding future".
A bit of a depressing outlook but in the end, good ol' Larry comes to realize that with all his self-perceived shortcomings and disappointments, he has his own unique story that just keeps unfolding before him. And it's not all that bad. In fact, it's quite beautiful. The final chapter contains lots of choppy dialogue amongst nine characters at Larry's party. There is a sence of tension and drama that wasn't present in the previous chapters. I think it would have been cool if that one chapter were written in play format.
After all, Larry looks at his life the same way Macbeth did. It's a tale told by an idiot full of sound and fury signifying nothing. Read Larry's Party for some food for thought. Jul 19, Linda Prieskorn rated it really liked it Recommended to Linda by: Larry is a typical boring human who plods through life.
The author uses 's of comparisons to benchmark Larry against average people. She repeats many scenarios about his life, his first marriage, his life as a child as he progresses through life. As boring as the language is in the book you feel compelled to continue reading because Larry's life is your life.
You are not a famous statesman, you are not an olympic athlete, you are not in the news weekly, you write on Facebook and goodreads and Larry is a typical boring human who plods through life. You are not a famous statesman, you are not an olympic athlete, you are not in the news weekly, you write on Facebook and goodreads and that is the pinnacle of your fame.
Great quotes From Larry's Party - Men. These curios upholstered assemblages of bones, the fearful morality that attends them, the clutter of good luck and bad, the foolish choices, the seeds of the boys they"d all been - and those seeds sprouting inappropriately even as their hair thins and their muscles slacken.
Fighting for a little space in the world. Needing a little human attention. Getting it up, getting it off. When does it it stop? Does it ever stop? It seems that once there's enough money, enough recognition, enough love - not that he loves Charlotte Angus, exactly - then there's nothing to look forward to except the next minute. And the most timely of all - He's noticed that the heft of of money makes the bodies of the wealthy more dense, more boldly angled and thus threatening even when suited, dressed, coated - and wrapped in the soundlessness of their immense, padded, and luxuriously ventilated office spaces.
The rich are underpinned by ignorance, he's noticed. They know nothing of the authentic scent of dust and dowdiness. The rich- except for the self made rich- believe they're biting at the apple of life just because they know enough to appreciate pre-Columbian art and hand pieced quilts. They-re out of touch, they breathe the dead air of their family privilege. Larry is you and if you are as lucky as Larry your life will end with a satisfying twist. A few professional reviews likened this to her The Stone Diaries , but from a man's viewpoint.
I did not see the commonality. In the Diaries, I always felt as if the person was real, while in Larry's I never did. From the beginning, it felt as if a woman trying to write from a man's point of view and not quite making it. Throughout, Shields repeats parts of the story given in earlier chapters. It's almost as if she thinks you will take a long time reading it and might forget what has gone on befor A few professional reviews likened this to her The Stone Diaries , but from a man's viewpoint.
It's almost as if she thinks you will take a long time reading it and might forget what has gone on before so she has to remind you. The shining moment in this is the final chapter. Sometimes an author doesn't quite know how to end a novel. Shields certainly knows and does it in fine style. That doesn't mean I didn't find this a nice interlude from some of my other reads. And I'll likely read her again, though I think I'll put some space between this and the next one. May 06, Rebecca McNutt rated it really liked it Shelves: This odd but interesting Canadian novel is a very different sort of reading experience.
I really liked it for the most part, and its 20th century settings throughout the story made it even more creative. Aug 14, Jean rated it really liked it.
In the end, I liked this book far better than I imaginged I would. I had a professor once who stated, "A brain soaked in testostrone, does not function like a brain soaked in estrogen! Men and women function differently and neither really understands the other, even In the end, I liked this book far better than I imaginged I would.
Men and women function differently and neither really understands the other, even when we think we do. Having said that, Shields does a good job of imagining what is going on in Larry's mind. It is the story of Larry's internal and external life told in chunks from the age of about 26 to about 46 - a rather interesting 20 years. Shields writing style for this novel is interesting in that for all the well written prose, with great discriptions and wonderful vocabulary - the sections seem to be written independent of each other; often as if the reader had no other knowledge of Larry's history.
I found that a bit disruptive to the story, but then just got used to it. The ending came as not a surprise exactly and in retrospect I probably should have anticipated it a bit more than I did. The ending made the book for me, without it, I would have only given this book a three star review. It is worth the read, enjoy! Sep 06, Kirsty Dummin rated it it was ok. I found this book difficult to read. Not because it wasn't well written, Shields certainly knows how to write. Having read a little of Shield's technique for structuring her work, I know that she has less of a focus on plot and more on the ordering of her chapters, which I think is very evident in Larry's Party.
As the name would suggest, the novel does conclude with a party for protagonist, Larry, but it is a long and convoluted path to get there. Each chapter begins with a recap of the previou I found this book difficult to read. Each chapter begins with a recap of the previous scenes, which is frustrating as you almost feel like it was pointless to read everything prior.
Or worse, that as a reader perhaps you hadn't absorbed the information given to you earlier. Each chapter covers a period of Larry's life, from age 17 to some time in his 40s, including two marriages and a son. This is all well and good, but most of these scenes are reflected back on, rather than being in the present, until we get to the party. Sadly, I never once finished a chapter and wanted to continue on to the next. I could have happily put it down and never returned to it, which I seldom do. Dec 06, Pat rated it really liked it.
I really enjoyed reading this book. At first I thought the subject matter was going to put me off but in the end I came to like Larry. I like the idea that a person can find inspiration in a particular situation and then go on to build a life on that inspiration. Larry goes in to his first maze at Hampton Court while on his honeymoon and it is a life changing experience for him. I did find the idea of surrounding ones own house with a maze a bit weird and obviously it was more than Dorrie could I really enjoyed reading this book.
I did find the idea of surrounding ones own house with a maze a bit weird and obviously it was more than Dorrie could bear. Buy the selected items together This item: Ships from and sold by Amazon. Customers who bought this item also bought. Page 1 of 1 Start over Page 1 of 1. The God of Small Things: The Remains of the Day. How We Lose and Find Ourselves. Here's how restrictions apply. Penguin Books September 1, Language: Start reading Larry's Party on your Kindle in under a minute. Don't have a Kindle?
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Kindle Edition Verified Purchase. After reading the marvelous Stone Diaries I was looking for more of the dame from this talented and smart writer. This book was in many ways disappointing despite the intelligent and at times clear eyed and at the same time poetic writing. Simply I would say that the author is better writing about women than about men. I have gotten a much more clear feeling about the women in the book than about Larry. The only truly great chapter was for me Larry's Party.
Tough the women were coming through clear and loud with Larry just a blob hanging on. One person found this helpful. A decent book, which loosely suggests a maze-like labyrinthine feel during the story evolution; but this is more implied than actively structured, unlike the way Emily Bronte consciously used structure in Wuthering Heights.
Just as when men try to write about female characters, there are some shallow and stereotypical touches, especially regarding Larry's sexuality. His instantly responsive penis is the stuff of fantasy, as many men experience erection loss the first time or two with a new woman, and often during the very first time having sex. The mid-life depression mentioned above is described as his "present confusion" He marvels at those "mysteries" he knows lie "snugged in the corners of the universe" And again the imagery can be traced back to the maze.
With its "beguiling shadows" and its "twists through the mystery of desire and frustration" , the labyrinth parallels the bewildering route Larry travels. For example, the young Larry reflects on his "deficient love for Dorrie, how it came and went, how he kept finding it and losing it again," which he links to his introduction to the Hampton Court maze, where "getting lost, and then found, seemed the whole point" Most frequently, however, those images relate to the instability of selfhood.
The Larry who has left Dorrie has "lost his son, his wife, his place on the planet" The depression-burdened Larry senses that "one wrong step would throw him off-course, and that what he would lose would be not money or friendship or intention, but his own self" Faludi notes that members of the domestic-violence group she observes "had without exception lost their compass in the world" 9. Connell has asked in noting the paradox underlying all normative definitions of masculinity Larry ultimately resumes his interrupted relationship with Dorrie, and the chapter chronicling his depression concludes with the reassuring announcement that he is "back to being Larry Weller again, husband, father, home owner, tuxedo wearer" But elsewhere images of loss are unmitigated by recovery.
Like others with nicknames, Larry has "relinquished a little morsel of [his] DNA, [his] panic and [his] pride" And his circumcision at birth resulted, poignantly, in "a little piece of himself missing, thrown away, returned to dust" Irrevocably gone is the humanist essentialist assumption that "each individual possesses a unified, unique selfhood which is also the expression of a universal human nature" Anderson 5. The novel offers a postmodern understanding of male identity as fluid, provisional, and multifaceted.
As he commences his walk home, his new apparel assumes the character of an alternative, protean self. The deluxe fabric was "shifting and reshifting. Inside him, and outside him too. It was like an apartment. He could move into this jacket and live there" With this promise of a new identity comes a new bearing — "Here comes the Big Guy, watch out for the Big Guy" 4 — a new language, as he suddenly thinks of the word "quadrant" for the first time in years 4 , and new emotions, with the realization that he loves Dorrie.
But by the end of the chapter Larry, fearing discovery, has deposited the jacket in a trash bin. Having lost the sureties attached to the old garment and rejected the possibilities hovering in the folds of the new one, he is poised between selves. Coral Ann Howells points out that the novel presents "a postmodern performative concept of identity as shifting, relational and subject to endless refigurings" 6.
The Larry Weller Story" Life comprises a succession of parts to which he struggles to adapt. Thus, confronted with the "new role" 20 of spouse to Dorrie, Larry clamps his jaw in a "husbandlike way" to "keep panic at a distance" As Butler has famously argued, "gender is always a doing, though not a doing by a subject who might be said to preexist the deed. Masculinity studies scholarship has been able to employ this performative conception of gender to explore "how and why masculine identities are constructed, socially and personally" Berger, Wallis, and Watson, "Introduction" 3 , as well as, for example, the possible implications for alternate masculinities.
To leave a labyrinth, the walker must turn around and retrace his or her steps. A walker leaving a labyrinth is not the same person who entered it, but has been born again into a new phase or level of existence. Kern 30 In the novel this conjunction of revelation and rebirth occurs not once but recurrently. Interestingly, however, while we assume mazes to be necessarily single-centred, more eclectically designed contemporary mazes may in fact contain more than one goal Wright As we have seen, whatever moments of insight Larry may achieve are undermined by subsequent bouts of incomprehension and confusion.
Sometimes, too, he felt he needed lessons in how to be a grown-up man" As that final sentence indicates, his angst issues in part from a concern that his performance s of masculinity will be judged wanting. And so the impostor Larry "prepares himself for exposure and ruin" Painfully aware of his lack of distinctiveness, he perceives that ordinariness as threatening an already shaky selfhood with total dissolution.
Thus his adolescence he sums up as "an unmemorable smudge in the yearbook" , and he later fears that his "freakish profession is the only thing that keeps him from disappearing" The danger conformity poses to the survival of a distinct identity is apparent too in the scene where he discovers that he and Dr.