Customer Reviews

HUMPTY DUMPTY: AN OVAL

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

It's been tough to find a book in the "mind" of Philip K Dick since his death, except for Michael Bishop's ".. Alas" it seemed the mind-game genre was done and then I found this. Mr. Knight's previous had never floored me (except his true hisotry book "The Futurians") but this is something else. I see lower scores here and figure that the type of story is just "quirky" or "cute" to many readers but if you're really into reality-questioning fiction then this is one not to miss.

If you like it, do try the later PKD novels (starting with Maze Of Death) and, this may sound odd but it's true, go back and re-read Socrates for fun.

I must have either missed a whole bunch of allusions and metaphors in this book, otherwise I simply can't understand what the previous reviewers were thinking. I found the story incredibly disjointed, becoming more so towards the conclusion. Perhaps owing to my own obtuse nature I failed to understand anything concerning the plot or the characters. One the whole, nothing was resolved to my satisfaction. I can only hope that other readers will have a more satisfying experience that my own. Please - don't hesitate to fill me in if you can figure this one out! cheers

I don't remember much about the book except that one paragraph detailing "why I don't want to be a woman." I have had to check out the book from the libaray again just to read that one paragraph. I remember enjoying the book, but that one paragraph. When DID I sign up for the beauty contest, anyway? I don't remember.

This is some book but it you prefer reading books that stay on the surface of the story and don't ask the reader to fill in the blanks you might miss out on some of its more cryptic features.

What is consciousness and what is reality? I've seen a lot of explanations before reading Humpty Dumpty by Damon Knight. This may be the best fictional examination of what it means to live inside the frail shells we've been given.

If you want a simple book that doesn't ask you to work for or think about the words, you'd be better off with something action-adventure, which is not to denigrate action/adventure, just to say that different books will appeal to different readers, and judging from some of the reader comments, this book obviously won't work for everyone. If you want a complex literary work, and the last novel written by one of America's masters, give Humpty Dumpty a chance.

In this technically brilliant piece of writing, Damon Knight tells the story of an ordinary man experiencing an extraordinary twist of fate. Wellington Stout is a lingerie salesman, a gentle man who thinks his job grants him an intimate understanding of women. It turns out that he's better suited to covering up that which mystifies him; he tries, but he's not up to understanding his topsy-turvy life. When he's shot in the head, his fractured skull serves as a metaphor for a widening fractured world.

This literate, funny, surreal, and heartbreaking novel makes me want to re-read Joyce. The surface story is one small part of the novel, and as other readers have noted, the book might not reach everyone who reads it. Readers who enjoy the challenge of literary archaeologic dig will discover hidden truths and surprise through their careful examination of this deeply layered, multidimensional work.

In my opinion this book was generally good. The only reason I gave it 3 stars is because the first third of the book was excrutiating to get through. After that It was an easy read though there is alot going on in the book and many charecters that although briefly mentioned play big parts in the book. It is defiantly a book you'll have to read at least twice to catch all the little details of the book. But it did well in capturing the insanity that would be reality falling apart. and I did enjoy it. It (in my opinion) would have been best to stay to the short story format Knight is popularly known for.

This book is a must have for anyone who is into the "question reality" type books.It started off kind of slow and I didnt think i would like it,but by the end i looked back and realized how good of a book it actually was.The only thing i didnt enjoy was the main character going off for a page or two about womens breasts and other sexual organs,I didnt see the purpose and those pages could have been used to fill in other things instead of talking about breasts.But that is just in the beginning and every once in a while through the book.I could have thought of better things to put int he book and i caught myself making up little things that should have been included but werent.Over all its a very well written book and like i said a must have if you enjoyed the Matrix or any of Philip K Dicks books.

All the reviews say that the parts of this book are better than the whole. To me, the parts are mildly amusing and quite disjointed. So far (1/2 way into the book) I would rather be reading a selection of short stories. So if the whole is less than the sum of its parts, I might as well quit reading this book now.

Wellington Stout, an unassuming salesman who "travels in women's undergarments", finds himself embroiled in a sequence of bizarre events in this madcap sci-fi novel by Damon Knight. The story opens as Stout wakes up in a hospital after being shot in the head in a Milanese restaurant (or was he?) having just delivered (or not) a "sensitive" parcel to an agent (of whom?) named Roger Wort. Confusion is the standard motif of this incomprehensible book, as Stout continues to undergo an endless array of hallucinatory (or are they?) experiences, from encounters with underground organizations of Dentists and Podiatrists (one of too few truly humorous touches) all the way out to alien invaders. Unfortunately, there's no attempt to wrap up all the twists and turns the story appears to take, and some may feel that the resolution offered in the book's final pages is really no resolution at all. The circumstances don't allow for anything like characterization, as people change identities right before our eyes, and no one's motivation is ever certain. By letting us see the world through Stout's eyes, Knight convincingly portrays a man who has absolutely no idea what's going on, but gives us very little reason to care. As a comedy the book falls rather distinctly short, and in the absence of any moral or philosophical direction, one wonders why this book was even written at all.

Easy to read...very odd! The author has quite an imagination! (At least I hope it's just his imagination! haha!)