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57 of 59 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
To Find a Silver Chalice, August 8, 2005
This review is from: Freddy and Fredericka (Hardcover)
My advice is to find a quiet place and prepare to read this one all the way through in one sitting. Don't get lost in the comedy--though it is hilariously funny, it is a gallows humor. As ridiculous as the plot or characters may seem, the book is never far from the truth. Our society passed into the absurd some time ago and Mr. Helprin is merely holding up a mirror.
In my opinion there are a good deal of readers who just don't get this book. It would be most instructive for them to review Mr. Helprin's "Swan Lake" series and to see Mr. Helprin's contempt for the ersatz "leaders" most now choose to follow. If we learn anything from this book, and most will choose to disregard its very simple teachings, it is that anything just and true has a cost. Those who pay the cost are entitled to an understanding that brings the peace and contentment that money or fame falsely promises. Frankly, there is not one of Mr. Helprin's works that doesn't clearly address a theme of rising above the ordinary--a quest for perfection.
An author this gifted writes at many levels--I cannot hope to have plumbed the depth of this work on one reading but like his other novels expect the book to reward additional study. Helprin reminds us that we each have an unlimited destiny and power to do good in the world if we will choose the correct path. Indeed, that there is one correct path to success, which is admirably summarized by Freddy in a particularly memorable speech, is Helprin's message. There are no shortcuts. There is absolute truth.
We can become kings and queens--it is our inheritance. Disagree if you will with the message or its presentation but I have encountered no other modern author possessed of the sheer force of language to do justice to the argument.
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79 of 84 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
The Man Who Would Be King, July 14, 2005
This review is from: Freddy and Fredericka (Hardcover)
"Though it is hard to be a king, it is harder yet to become one." Thus begins Mark Helprin's hilariously wacky fantasy "Freddy and Fredericka". Freddy is the Prince of Wales. In private he is a fit and intelligent man approaching middle age who tests his physical skills by hiking across the wilds of Scotland with nothing but a backpack. He is thoughtful and well read. In public, he is ungainly and misunderstood. His rather large ears and his penchant for making malaprop-riddled public utterances make him a laughingstock to the British public. His wife, Fredericka can do no wrong. Considerably younger than Freddy, she is beautiful but empty-headed. Despite that, no matter what she says, no matter how vacuous or wrong headed the public eats it up. Freddy's mother, Queen Phillipa, abhors Fredericka. The Queen's relationship with her daughter-in-law is dysfunctional to say the least. Freddy has a sizzling relationship with an older yet extraordinarily passionate woman, the aptly named Lady Phoebe Boylinghotte. Freddy and Fredericka's relationship is strained to say the least. Sound familiar yet? As the story opens, Freddy is in the Scottish Highlands trying unsuccessfully to get a falcon to fly at his command. This is no trivial matter. The falcon will only fly for someone with the qualities to be a king and no Prince of Wales can succeed to the throne unless can make the falcon fly. Freddy has failed in his first three attempts. He has one more to go. After a series of hilariously funny misadventures that makes Freddy look like an insane clod a mysterious stranger, a wizard in fact, is summoned to Buckingham Palace in what can only be described as a royal intervention. Mr. Neil, who claims to be old enough to have first-hand knowledge of the earliest Kings of England, with the blessing of the Queen, commands Freddy and Fredericka to go out on a quest to prove they are worthy of the throne. Their task is to reconquer America. To that end they are stripped of their clothes and money and flown to the States in a military aircraft. They parachute out of the aircraft and find themselves in "Hohokus" a wet swampy area just west of New York City. Their subsequent journey takes them through the United States. They hop rail cars, do manual labor and see a side of the U.S. and the world that no royal has ever seen. As they discover America they also discover themselves and, more importantly each other. By this point it becomes clear that any similarity between Helprin's fantasy Prince and Princess and any real royal persons is superficial; just a jumping off point for an exploration of what lies below the surface of those we only know through the media. It is also a nice jumping off point for what lies below the surface of all of us. Helprin does this without ever slowing down the pace or humor of the story. A mere description of the outline cannot describe the enjoyment I derived from reading the book. Helprin's writing style is funny and frenetic. It is also thoughtful. Some readers may not find the Dickensian names Helprin gives some of his characters particularly witty. I found them endearing. Some may think that some of the humorous set piece fall flat. For example, the linguistic confusion Freddy experiences in discussing the relationship between one Dewey Knott and his uncle Arwe Knott revisits Abbott and Costello's classic "Who's on First" routine. Some may think it derivative. I thought it worked very well. Some of humor did not work for me but that is only a minor complaint when viewing the book as a whole. The most enjoyable part of Freddy and Fredericka was the fact that the book evoked so many different reference points for me. The snappy one liners, word-play and somewhat less than dry British wit that marks the first portion of the book seemed one part Yes Minister (a Britcom that poked fun at British politicians and civil servants), one part Dickens and one part Monty Python. Freddy and Freddy's journeys through the U.S. to reconquer America contained some (distant) echoes of Mark Twain; the old movie Sullivan's Travels (a pampered Hollywood movie star goes on a quest through Depression-era America in the guise of a hobo), and Kipling's The Man Who Would be King. All in all, despite a couple of flaws and false notes, I enjoyed Freddy and Fredericka immensely. The book turns reflective as it nears its conclusion but I think the zany adventures that precede the conclusion renders the change in tone and pace more effective. Shakespeare's Richard II demanded people to "let us sit upon the ground and tell sad stories of the death of kings!" In the case of Freddy and Fredericka you won't go wrong if you sit upon the ground (or preferably the beach) and read this zanily-realized fantasy of the birth of a king.
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18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Huckleberry Fred, July 12, 2005
This review is from: Freddy and Fredericka (Hardcover)
Freddy and Fredericka tells the tale of two familiar characters: a large-eared English prince prone to muck up public relations at every conceivable opportunity, and his blonde consort, a princess who is as ditzy as she is beautiful. But instead of degenerating into the cheapened tabloid tragedy of Charles and Diana, the lives of Freddy and Fredericka are suddenly and miraculously redeemed by an unexpected series of events -- on the orders of the mysterious "Mr Neil," the apparent power behind the British throne (the name's an anagram, hint hint), they are parachuted naked into New Jersey with the understanding that they are to remain in exile until they can win back the American "Colonies" and reincorporate them into the British Empire.
If the plot at this point sounds ridiculous, it only becomes stranger and more fanciful. Freddy and Fredericka, during the course of the novel, find themselves battling Neonazis, driving hotdog mobiles, posing as dentists from a state whose name they can't pronounce, and managing a presidential campaign (which is perhaps the most farcical incident of all), along with many other strange and magnificent adventures that I won't give away. Helprin has crafted an amazingly hilarious book that, while lighter and more readable than his earlier efforts A Soldier of the Great War and Winter's Tale, still manages to be moving. The farce is somewhat unsubtle (Fredericka's dog is named Fah Kew, and whenever it goes missing, perpetually misunderstood Freddy must roam the streets screaming "Fah Kew! Fah Kew!" in the earshot of horrified and insulted citizens), but is most often absolutely, uproariously funny and, incidentally, perfectly suited for a film -- will we see our first Helprin movie in the near future? One can only hope.
In sum, Freddy and Fredericka is a little long for such a lighthearted book, but with its fast pace, parade of fantastic characters, and picaresque roots (it reads like a postmodern, slightly Nabokovian Huck Finn) it is a novel that most anyone can enjoy, while diehard Helprin fans like myself will be over the moon. Mr. Helprin's first novel in ten years does not disappoint -- it is a marvelous, gripping story that had me crying both tears of laughter and of emotion.
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