One Man's Chorus: The Uncollected Writings [Hardcover]

Anthony Burgess (Author), Ben Forkner (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 1998

One Man''s Chorus is a sampler of thought and opinion from the author of A Clockwork Orange. Burgess rarely fails to amuse in this generous selection of essays on topics as various as oranges, Marilyn Monroe, God and Yiddish humour.'

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Novelist and critic Burgess was a polymath, a man with immense stores of erudition on history, music, art, religion, philosophy?whatever caught his fancy and lodged in his very capacious mind. He also had a good journalist's knack of being able to write to order, swiftly and interestingly, on a multitude of topics. So in this collection of occasional pieces published in the last two decades of his life, he ruminates on subjects as various as Margaret Thatcher, Yeats, Ravel, Sir Walter Scott, his own Clockwork Orange (which came to haunt him, as did the celebrated movie version that was derived, he says, from the inferior American edition that lacked his own final chapter), his youth in Manchester, the British royal family and the temperament of the French. Many of these pieces may have been written in haste, but they do not show it: Burgess is always alert, well informed and infinitely readable. One of the themes running through the collection is his regret at having to spend so much time and effort at the sort of writing that pays the bills rather than at his preferred fiction. Much to his amused disgust, he came to be regarded more as a critic than as a novelist?though he was no mean practitioner of either art.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

The late Burgess had an immense bag of tricks, and this gathering of uncollected works from the past 20 years shows them all. It's not just that there's a lot to learn: an essay called "A Clockwork Orange Resucked," for example, informs us that U.S. readers know a "Nixonian" version lacking a 21st chapter of redemption for the thuggish protagonist, while the rest of the world knows a 21-chapter "Kennedyan" book. It's also a lot of fun: an essay on Venice starts with an allusion to Nicholas Roeg and his "off-season Venice" and contrasts it with Burgess's first experiences with "touristic Venice"?"affronted by fat matronly bottoms in shorts, it shudders at the clicking Leicas, it wistfully puts money in its purse, serves bad food, and waits patiently for the advent of bad weather and a resumption of heavy drinking." Outrageousness was always part of Burgess's shtick, and here you get all that and more. Recommended for all literature collections.?Robert E. Brown, Onondaga Cty. P.L., Syracuse, NY
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 380 pages
• Publisher: Carroll & Graf Pub (December 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 078670568X
• ISBN-13: 978-0786705689
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.1 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,655,593 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Burgess should've concentrated on journalism, February 5, 2005

By 

Gooch McCracken (c/o your haunted slab of Velveeta) - See all my reviews

This review is from: One Man's Chorus: The Uncollected Writings (Paperback)

This is top-drawer Tone-boy. Right up there with A MOUTHFUL OF AIR, his book about languages. His travel writing is on a par with Tim Moore's meisterwerks.

From WINTERREISE: "That wind still blows me towards Germany, but what I have to avoid is a strange siren voice borne on it, a quality of the German temperament that I find in myself and have always tried to subdue. This may be termed the sentimentality of the death-wish, which the end of TRISTAN AND ISOLDE succeeds in ennobling, but, in less transcendental forms, has always subtly qualified the German delight in making, building, constructing--whether a RING or a CRITIQUE OF PURE REASON."

And here's what Julian Barnes never got around to saying: "The French seem determined to destroy their Roman inheritance by chopping up words until they become as short as possible, and as capable of being confused with other chopped-up words as only a genuinely morbid condition of language can allow. Even when a French word or name bears some visual resemblance to its classical original, the spoken form submits to the axe. I can never grow used to pronouncing 'Jesus Christ' as 'Jezu Cri', and I feel that if the French could cut the holy name down to something like 'Je Cr', they would."

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Writing as Music, December 5, 2000

By 

Ryuichi (Ayaseshi, Kanagawaken Japan) - See all my reviews

This review is from: One Man's Chorus: The Uncollected Writings (Paperback)

Whenever I retrospect Anthony Burgess, I am reminded of one comment: 'While the estimation of Burgess as a novelist is controversial, that as a critic is appreciated almost unanimously.' Probably its truth becomes more and more apparent as time passes. Among his well-known critical writings are "The Novel Now" and its development "99 Novels: the Best in English since 1939", and what is more, the collections of journalistic pieces: "Urgent Copy", and "Hommage to QWERT YUIOP". This one, collected poshumously, was published in paperback form this year.

According to the preface, the editor saw Burgess when he came to his university when he was wrestling with a doctorial dissertation and feeling bored. He was fascinated by Burgess'freewheeling character, wide reading and total recall. He says that Burgess could speak on almost all the themes of literature and recite endlessly 'The Wreck of the Deutchland' by G. M. Hopkins.

The construction is: (1)Genius Loci--invocation to a land (2)In Our Time--current pieces (3)Ars Poetica--on general culture (4)Anniversaries & Celebration--a lament for the dead

As is usual, the topics vary widely from Orson Wells, Marylin Monroe to Thatcher. I am a little surprised that I read it through easily as if I were carried by the stream of music of a 4-part Motet. The word 'infinitely readable' also appears on the back cover. His writing seems like a later Mozart.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great Book for musicians, April 5, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: One Man's Chorus: The Uncollected Writings (Paperback)

Some great, informative writing, especially for musicians - Burgess was a composer as well as a writer. I am a music reviewer and I found his essays on Shaw and music most informative, ditto on Ravel. I do not think too much of the editorial comments, however.