Mawrdew Czgowchwz (New York Review Books Classics) [Paperback]

James McCourt (Author), Wayne Koestenbaum (Introduction)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 1, 2002 | Series: New York Review Books Classics

Diva Mawrdew Czgowchwz (pronounced "Mardu Gorgeous") bursts like the most brilliant of comets onto the international opera scene, only to confront the deadly malice and black magic of her rivals. Outrageous and uproarious, flamboyant and serious as only the most perfect frivolity can be, James McCourt's entrancing send-up of the world of opera has been a cult classic for more than a quarter-century. This comic tribute to the love of art is a triumph of art and love by a contemporary American master.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Debuting in 1971, McCourt's comedic novel takes on the world of opera through title character Mawrdew Czgowchwz (pronounced "Mardu Gorgeous"), who finds herself both the darling of fans and the bane of other divas, who are less than welcoming and maternal to the new star. There are few opera parodies out there, so this should appeal to fans.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Review

"McCourt is the author of perhaps the best novel about opera."— Publishers Weekly

"McCourt makes brave comic choices, delighting in mythic celebrity while dissecting the ways it is made and sustained. Bravo! Encore!"— John Lahr

"Bravo, James McCourt, a literary countertenor in the exacting tradition of Firbank and Nabokov, who makes his daringly self—assured debut with this intelligent and very funny book."— Susan Sontag

"Mawrdew Czgowchwz is a Zuleika Dobson of the opera world. James McCourt is an ecstatic fabulist, robustly funny and inventive, and touchingly in love with his subject. His novel is both special and precious, in the most honorable senses of those words."— Newsweek

"A gloriously flamboyant debut. Take it in spoonfuls and you’ll find passages to fall in love with. Sooner or later, you may even find yourself reading them aloud to your friends."— Christopher Lehmann—Haupt, The New York Times --This text refers to the Kindle Edition edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 221 pages
• Publisher: NYRB Classics (February 1, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0940322978
• ISBN-13: 978-0940322974
• Product Dimensions: 5 x 0.6 x 8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.3 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,042,722 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

35 of 37 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful, but Not For Everyone, February 28, 2002

By 

KS (US) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Mawrdew Czgowchwz (New York Review Books Classics) (Paperback)

This book is not for everyone. The prose style is dense, there are far too many characters, and the novel requires at least a passing knowledge of opera. However, the cattyness of the observations, the rhythmns of the sentences and their unexpected twists and turns, make for delightful reading.

A sample of the prose is the best introduction.
"While His Scarlet Eminence and Msgr. Finneagle sat playing their esoteric version of Monopoly, the custom-crafted board for which could be seen to represent the several circles of Dante's Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso, as well as the ground plan for the entire Vatican, both the above-ground palaces' apartments, closets, and chapels, and those labyrinthine catacomb reaches where Darkest Rumor is said on good authority to repose in thrilling reptile fashion. His Scarlet Eminence snickered in pixyish glee, having caught his opponent in the square of the seventh circle of hell (with four hotels). Monsignor trembled (livid), bankrupt of plenary indulgence."

Should you find this amusing and well-written, you'll love this book. If not, you'd best pass.

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Dazzling but not enchanting, March 11, 2002

By 

Jay Dickson (Portland, OR) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

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This review is from: Mawrdew Czgowchwz (New York Review Books Classics) (Paperback)

The comparisons that have made between MAWRDEW CZGOWCHWZ and the novels of Ronald Firbank are just... perhaps too much so. Part of the charm of Firbank's novels is their utter singularity; they seem so one-of-a-kind, that they captivate by their. In MAWRDEW, McCourt transplants the heady atmosphere of Firbank's faraway kingdoms and cities to the "Gotham" of the postwar era, but the effect seems a little derivative. Moreover, while McCourt attains the kinds of virtuoso effects of Firbank's prose you keep getting the feeling you're expected to admire the effort rather than be moved by it. There's nothing like the deep-seated anguish that makes the best of Firbank's novels (such as THE FLOWER BENEATH THE FOOT) really transcend their glibness. Almost inevitably the foreword for this edition was written by Wayne Koestenbaum: the book seems to have been written exactly with him in mind as its audience.

15 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Gorgeousness for gorgeousness' sake, May 3, 2002

By 

Eric Leventhal (Bflo, NY United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Mawrdew Czgowchwz (New York Review Books Classics) (Paperback)

After seeing blurbs on Mawrdew Czgowchwz in two magazines and an on-line newsletter, I said "I have to read this book!" Now I have read it and I didn't. The writing is gorgeous, but too much so. Brobdingnagian aggregations of rare multisyllabic verbiage traipse, saunter, stroll, galumph across the page-sometimes arm-in-arm with an idiomatic epigram or eponym-implying to the ophthalmic interlocutor notions of sylvatic artistry, ecstatic glamour and libidinous merriment. Do you know what I mean, toots?
McCourt's theme is the transcendent power of art. The problem I have with the book is McCourt makes you work too hard. His style and vocabulary get in the way of his message. Achieving transcendence in a spiritual sense takes discipline and stamina. But to be whisked away in the concert hall, all you have to do is listen.
Mawrdew Czgowchcz has engaging characters (with fabulous names) a terrific plot, wicked satire and many fun incidents all of which you will enjoy, if you can pry them out McCourt's thickly gilded sentences. Yes, it is very much like Firbank, but Firbank, for his baroque obtuseness, is still swift and immediate on the page.
I wanted to be engulfed and swept away by Mawrdew, instead I just bobbed along the surface, admiring but not fully appreciating. A little less gorgeousness would serve Mawrdew Czgowchcz much better.