Laurence Sterne - Tristram Shandy and A Sentimental Journey

[Jackson Richardson]

I tried reading Tristram Shandy when I was at college and gave up a third through.

I read it through a few years' ago. and found it confusing. Would I just be a pseud to express admiration?

I downloaded an audio book of it this summer as an impulse online purchase (and in one sense there is no other book that is so much a book rather than words - blank and missing pages and so forth) and I found I was appreciating it.

This month I toured round North Yorkshire and made a point of visiting Coxwold ( a lovely limestone village) and Sterne's vicarage. It was well worth the visit.

Any Sterne enthusiasts here?

(In case you don't know the book, it is the longest shaggy dog story going, the smuttiest book by an Anglican vicar, it was the favourite book of Karl Marx, and beloved by the arch anti-modernist, C S Lewis. It has no plot.)

[Anton Hermes]

Tristram Shandy is indeed confusing at first. But once you get into it, it's a wild ride. It's the original destabilized postmodern text, all about play and not about plot.

And the fact that the book starts out with a digression is just proof of what an evil genius Sterne was.

[stlukesguild]

It's one of my favorite novels... maybe my favorite English novel. And it brilliantly deconstructs the the "tradition" of the rather nascent literary form that was the novel. It also boasts one of the finest male friendships in literature... along with Huck and Jim, the Don and Sancho, and Mason and Dixon.

[Anton Hermes]

It also boasts one of the finest male friendships in literature... along with Huck and Jim, the Don and Sancho, and Mason and Dixon.
You forgot Didi and Gogo, and Jacques and his master. But you probably didn't read that far.

[Sydneysider]

I regret to say I have not read this work. Always meant to... I just rang my local book shop. They have it.

Thanks for the timely reminder.

[Charles Darnay]

What really sold me on Shandy the first time i read it - aside from the humour, because it is one of the funniest books written -was Uncle Toby. Forget all the "gimmicks" if you must (but you are missing out) and you are left with one of the greatest characters ever. The mixture of comedy and pure sentimentalism is unmatched.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

You forgot Didi and Gogo, and Jacques and his master. But you probably didn't read that far.

Oh, sweet, let's get in a pissing match to see who can name the most friendships in literature! Hmmm . . . Google, here I come!

[Calidore]

Sam and Frodo.

[OrphanPip]

Cambell and Triamond

[Jackson Richardson]

Uncle Toby and the fly made me think why I like Tristram Shandy and can't stand Gravity's Rainbow. If someone in Pynchon picked up a fly buzzing around, they'd almost certainly squash it flat in a brilliantly ungrammatical sentence and laugh their heads off.

But Gravity's Rainbow reflects a period of great political anxiety (the Cold War) and Tristram Shandy reflects a period of political stability - the Stuarts have been defeated under King William III (who Toby admires - he doesn't care for the Stuart Queen Anne) and the Whig supremacy is assured.

The only trouble is that the Enlightenment, finding a basis for understanding in empirical knowledge instead of endlessly citing ancient authorities, has not brought sweetness and light, but reveals how unstable is our empirical understanding of the world.

Sterne actually enjoys the citing of ancient authorities, while sending them up. And the instability of our understanding of the world, far from creating anxiety, is a source of celebration and amusement and humanity.

[mona amon]

Now I really want to read this! Just sent it from Project Gutenberg to my Kindle. :)

[Sydneysider]

Humpty Dumpty and his shell.

Sadly they broke up. :-(

[Scheherazade]

Snoopy and Woodstock.

[Anton Hermes]

Uncle Toby and the fly made me think why I like Tristram Shandy and can't stand Gravity's Rainbow. If someone in Pynchon picked up a fly buzzing around, they'd almost certainly squash it flat in a brilliantly ungrammatical sentence and laugh their heads off.

Aw, you hated Gravity's Rainbow? I look at it in the tradition of Sterne and Voltaire, that weird sort of comedy about innocents stumbling through wacky goings-on. And Pynchon's wacky goings-on were some pretty heady stuff.

[Charles Darnay]

Now I really want to read this! Just sent it from Project Gutenberg to my Kindle. :)

I wonder if Project Gutenberg reproduces the marbled page; you'll have to let us know.

[Jackson Richardson]

On my visit to Coxwold, I've seen a copy of the first edition in nine seperate volumes published over nearly ten years.

The marbled page is rather beautiful: like the endpaper of an C18 book and multi-coloured.

I was not allowed to photo it for copyright reasons.

It is extraordinary that the first two volumes were published in York at Sterne's own expense, and the later volumes by London booksellers when he was fashionable, but all the volumes are uniform.

[Charles Darnay]

Supposedly he was extremely meticulous about the physical printing of all volumes.

[Jackson Richardson]

That's what we were told. We were also told that after the publication of the first volume, prostitutes in Piccadilly were going up to potential customers and asking if they'd remembered to wind the clock.

[Anton Hermes]

We were also told that after the publication of the first volume, prostitutes in Piccadilly were going up to potential customers and asking if they'd remembered to wind the clock.

Whereas the East End floozies were still into Rabelais.

[dfloyd]

as the point of conception, as Tristram Shandy does. A gem of English literature. mY two-volume edition was published by the Limiyed Editions Club in 1935 and was designed and illustrated by T. M. Clelland, the great designer and illustrator of many 18th century novels, including Tom Jones and Johnathon Wild.

[mona amon]

I wonder if Project Gutenberg reproduces the marbled page; you'll have to let us know.

I'll let you know when I start. The version I downloaded said 'Kindle: images' and there was also a version with no images, so I'm hoping it does have the marbled page you all are talking about. :)