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andybobandy's review against another edition
2.0
OMFG. I am not even sure about the two stars. About half was "reasonable", but the rest? Ugh.
That play in the middle, the scientific study with unrelated footnotes, the interview with Barnette Tete, and several occurrences of lengthy lists of what? I don't know. Especially the one at the end of the book that goes on and on for nearly six pages.
I enjoy most books I read, even those that stretch the definition of what a novel is supposed to be, but this one was way too much.
That play in the middle, the scientific study with unrelated footnotes, the interview with Barnette Tete, and several occurrences of lengthy lists of what? I don't know. Especially the one at the end of the book that goes on and on for nearly six pages.
I enjoy most books I read, even those that stretch the definition of what a novel is supposed to be, but this one was way too much.
lee_foust's review against another edition
4.0
The novel that proves you can have too much of a good thing. Quality frivolity, but frivolity isn't really my thing.
themorbidcorvid's review against another edition
funny
mysterious
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
damianmurphy's review against another edition
4.0
A more fitting title for this book would be "Sorrentino's Excess."
One of the things that makes it so interesting is the existence of hidden patches of subtlety amidst some of the least subtle satire I've ever read. Sorrentino makes his point with the repeated assaults of a battering ram only to follow it up with the swipe of a feather duster with a single feather comically out of place in just such a way as to cast a shadow on a particular passage from Nabokov. A large portion of the book consists of a book-within-a-book written by the main character, Antony Lamont. I suspect there's an Andy Kaufman-like meta-narrative at play, as if Sorrentino is making fun of the kind of author who would write a book like Mulligan Stew every bit as much as he's making fun of Lamont. Parts of the book are really funny, while others are not nearly as funny as Sorrentino seems to think they are. Having read some of his other books, I can't quite believe that this isn't intentional.
Whatever the case, I'm glad I read it and I recommend it.
One of the things that makes it so interesting is the existence of hidden patches of subtlety amidst some of the least subtle satire I've ever read. Sorrentino makes his point with the repeated assaults of a battering ram only to follow it up with the swipe of a feather duster with a single feather comically out of place in just such a way as to cast a shadow on a particular passage from Nabokov. A large portion of the book consists of a book-within-a-book written by the main character, Antony Lamont. I suspect there's an Andy Kaufman-like meta-narrative at play, as if Sorrentino is making fun of the kind of author who would write a book like Mulligan Stew every bit as much as he's making fun of Lamont. Parts of the book are really funny, while others are not nearly as funny as Sorrentino seems to think they are. Having read some of his other books, I can't quite believe that this isn't intentional.
Whatever the case, I'm glad I read it and I recommend it.
chillcox15's review against another edition
5.0
A bit more programmatic than its Irish forebears, but Gilbert Sorrentino's Mulligan Stew is still a remarkable celebration and indictment of the poshlost clichéd possibilities of language. I took long breaks from it, and it drove me a bit mad, but isn't that what it is supposed to do?
professorpi's review against another edition
i tried so hard. but i got so sick of the pages of word salad. i kept coming back, thinking surely it will end! it did not. every time sorrentino drops a page of rhyming phrases straight out of r/showerthoughts i want to die. sometimes it was funny. but pages of miserable unfunny references i barely got were such a chore and i could not take it anymore. that play was the last straw. i am done. no more.
its not terrible. like it is better than a lot of other books. but it turns to this slop of language i just could not wade through.
edit: everyone else is saying it drags in the middle. this is true. i simply do not have the willpower to get through the middle. author absolutely loses track of the characters and proceeds to just ramble. for pages.
its not terrible. like it is better than a lot of other books. but it turns to this slop of language i just could not wade through.
edit: everyone else is saying it drags in the middle. this is true. i simply do not have the willpower to get through the middle. author absolutely loses track of the characters and proceeds to just ramble. for pages.
sippingdarjeerling's review against another edition
Its too difficult of a read right now but I will probably come back to it.
george_salis's review against another edition
"'The idea of a novel about a writer writing a novel is truly old hat. Nothing further can be done with the genre, a genre that was exhausted at its moment of conception.'
And yet Mulligan Stew is such a novel, the alpha-omega of the genre as far as I can tell. However, it doesn’t simply or complexly exist on a Mobius strip. We mustn’t forget the cosmic sea of stories it sprang from. In the same way that two scientists can independently discover a mathematical proof or scientific theory, for instance, Italo Calvino and Gilbert Sorrentino—our Darwin and Wallace—both wrote postmodern novels exemplary of the second half of the 20th century. That is, constructed in a deconstructed and hyper-conscious way, polyphonic, critical of reading, of writing, &c. Indeed, If on a winter’s night a traveler was published in the same year yet not Englished until a couple of years later. The latter is a novel about a reader reading a novel while this one is a novel about a writer writing a novel, mirrors held up to mirrors. Calvino was always concerned with symmetry, mathematical precision even (just look at the matrix he constructed for Invisible Cities), while Sorrentino’s Stew is purposefully superfluous despite the fairly clear structure, chunky in its broth, you could say. There’s plenty of fun to be had here as Sorrentino includes everything and the kitchen sink, as well as the chick’n shrink, the hitchin’ slink, the stitchin’ kink, the sickened think, the quicken blink, the witch’s drink, and the bitchin’ Sphinx, just the way I like my Stew."
Read my full review for free here: https://thecollidescope.com/2021/10/20/mulligan-stew-by-gilbert-sorrentino/
And yet Mulligan Stew is such a novel, the alpha-omega of the genre as far as I can tell. However, it doesn’t simply or complexly exist on a Mobius strip. We mustn’t forget the cosmic sea of stories it sprang from. In the same way that two scientists can independently discover a mathematical proof or scientific theory, for instance, Italo Calvino and Gilbert Sorrentino—our Darwin and Wallace—both wrote postmodern novels exemplary of the second half of the 20th century. That is, constructed in a deconstructed and hyper-conscious way, polyphonic, critical of reading, of writing, &c. Indeed, If on a winter’s night a traveler was published in the same year yet not Englished until a couple of years later. The latter is a novel about a reader reading a novel while this one is a novel about a writer writing a novel, mirrors held up to mirrors. Calvino was always concerned with symmetry, mathematical precision even (just look at the matrix he constructed for Invisible Cities), while Sorrentino’s Stew is purposefully superfluous despite the fairly clear structure, chunky in its broth, you could say. There’s plenty of fun to be had here as Sorrentino includes everything and the kitchen sink, as well as the chick’n shrink, the hitchin’ slink, the stitchin’ kink, the sickened think, the quicken blink, the witch’s drink, and the bitchin’ Sphinx, just the way I like my Stew."
Read my full review for free here: https://thecollidescope.com/2021/10/20/mulligan-stew-by-gilbert-sorrentino/
hyaenidae's review against another edition
3.0
This must have been the most eccentric book, that I ever laid eyes on. It is probably the most meta a metafiction book can get, even so, that Sorrentino went length to keep up the world he imagined - lyrically even going so far, that when telling the story about a bad writer, that chapters that are enclosed are actually badly written. It on one hand is an accolade to stick to the fiction, yet it boils down to the book being a very strenuous read for the more casual reader.
To sum it up: the writing style, the width and plethora of lyrical imaginations is amazing, the multiple meta-layers and the fun he has with it, is impressive, but the novel sometimes loses its steam in the middle part of the book and sometimes feels like Sorrentino was showing off whilst losing track of his protagonists.
To sum it up: the writing style, the width and plethora of lyrical imaginations is amazing, the multiple meta-layers and the fun he has with it, is impressive, but the novel sometimes loses its steam in the middle part of the book and sometimes feels like Sorrentino was showing off whilst losing track of his protagonists.