The World According to Garp: A Novel

John Irving

Oct 2018 · Sold by Penguin

About this ebook

Now available as an ebook for the first time ever in America, the bestselling coming-of-age classic novel by John Irving—the 40th anniversary edition with a new introduction by the author. 

“He is more than popular. He is a Populist, determined to keep alive the Dickensian tradition that revels in colorful set pieces...and teaches moral lessons.”—The New York Times 

The opening sentence of John Irving’s breakout novel The World According to Garp signals the start of sexual violence, which becomes increasingly political. “Garp’s mother, Jenny Fields, was arrested in Boston in 1942 for wounding a man in a movie theater.” Jenny is an unmarried nurse; she becomes a single mom and a feminist leader, beloved but polarizing. Her son, Garp, is less beloved, but no less polarizing. 

From the tragicomic tone of its first sentence to its mordantly funny last line—“we are all terminal cases”—The World According to Garp maintains a breakneck pace. The subject of sexual hatred—of intolerance of sexual minorities and differences—runs the gamut of “lunacy and sorrow.” Winner of the National Book Award, Garp is a comedy with forebodings of doom. In more than thirty languages, in more than forty countries—with more than ten million copies in print—Garp is the precursor of John Irving’s later protest novels.

Ratings and reviews

This one saw the movie when I was really young. Read the book about a decade later.... and again another decade later. I just say that I gain more appreciation for the human experience each time I come back to this story.

I found it to be a great book I couldn't put it down at the time I read it I had a roommate he worked rotating ships and I had to fight him for it cause he was reading it the same time very good book

About the author

John Irving, born in Exeter, New Hampshire, published his first novel, Setting Free the Bears, when he was twenty-six. His most popular novel worldwide is A Prayer for Owen Meany, published in 1989. In 2000, Mr. Irving won the Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay for The Cider House Rules. In 2013, he won the Lambda Literary Award for Bisexual Fiction for In One Person. In 2018, he was the recipient of a Dayton Literary Peace Prize, the Richard C. Holbrooke Award for Distinguished Achievement. Mr. Irving competed as a wrestler for twenty years and coached wrestling until he was forty-seven. He is a member of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame in Stillwater, Oklahoma. John Irving lives in Toronto.