Reuben, Reuben: A Novel

Peter De Vries

Nov. 2014 · University of Chicago Press

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Suburban absurdity meets good old American despair in this acclaimed novel by “the funniest serious writer to be found on either side of the Atlantic” (Kingsley Amis).

Harking from the golden age of fiction set in American suburbia—the school of John Updike and Cheever—this work from the great American humorist Peter De Vries looks with laughter upon its lawns, its cocktails, and its slightly unreal feeling of comfort. A manic epic, Reuben, Reuben is really three books in one, tied together by a 1950s suburban Connecticut setting and hyper-literate cast of characters.

A corruptible chicken farmer fearful for the fate of his beloved town, a womanizing poet from Wales (Dylan Thomas in disguise), and a hapless British poet-cum-actor-and-agent all take turns as narrator, revealing different, even conflicting views. But alcoholism, sexism, small-mindedness, and calamity challenge the high spirits of De Vries’s well-read suburbanites. Noted as much for his verbal fluidity and wordplay as for his ability to see humor through pain, De Vries will delight both new readers and old in this uproarious modern masterpiece.

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Peter De Vries (1910–93) was the man responsible for contributing to the cultural vernacular such witticisms as “Nostalgia ain’t what it used to be” and “Deep down, he’s shallow.” He was the author of many books, including the classics Slouching Towards Kalamazoo and The Blood of the Lamb, both also published by the University of Chicago Press.