Hume’s Fork - Hardcover

Cooper, Ron

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1890862509 ISBN 13: 9781890862503

Publisher: Bancroft Press, 2007

Synopsis

"Barely adequate philosophy professor Legare Hume has a mind-body problem. No matter how far he goes, no matter how hard he thinks, he can't escape the world he lives in. On the run from his wife Tally, Legare joins brilliant but exceptionally awkward colleague Saul Grossman to attend the American Philosophical Association’s Charleston, South Carolina conference, where worlds and walks of life collide in a strange and satirical amalgamation that can only be described as reality.Legare’s mission is simple enough: put up with the conference, read a paper he never thought anyone would want to hear, receive the tenure he isn't sure he wants, and return, or not, to the wife who nearly killed him before he left. But his plans are hijacked by a botched hotel reservation and the all-too-convenient presence of the Southern family Legare has worked very hard all his adult life to avoid.Hume’s Fork is a brilliantly satirical and philosophical novel, every bit as funny as it is intelligent―a true original. Legare’s conflict―Hume’s fork, if you will― becomes the reader’s, for all worlds are one, and nothing can truly be separate from everything else."

About this title

About the Author

A South Carolina native, Ron Cooper received a Ph.D. in philosophy from Rutgers University and now teaches at Central Florida Community College. He is the author of a number of philosophical essays in academic journals, such as the Journal of Speculative Philosophy and Philosophy Today, as well as the book Heidegger and Whitehead: A Phenomenological Examination into the Intelligibility of Experience (Ohio University Press). His short stories have appeared in Yalobusha Review, Timber Creek Review, Apostrophe, and The Blotter. With Hume's Fork, which is his first published novel, he was a finalist for the Bread Loaf Conference's Bakeless Literary Prize. A bluegrass enthusiast, he lives in Ocala, Florida, with his wife and three children.

From Booklist

This is a wacky novel, even for a satire. It stars a couple of philosophy professors who, on their way to a conference in North Carolina, get sidetracked and wind up bunking with a local family. The book's protagonist is Legare Hume, and the local family is his own: mother, father, and various relatives, including the only two Legare can stand, his sister and her small boy. He has spent most of his life trying to pretend his family doesn't exist, and now he watches, helplessly, as his fellow professor, Saul Grossman, fits right in, instantly seeming to become just one o' the boys. Cooper, a philosophy professor who hails from South Carolina, manages to tell a funny, fast-paced, hugely entertaining story that balances intricate philosophical ideas (the title itself is a pun, though you may need a crash course in logical positivism to get the joke) with outright zaniness (philosophizing wrestlers). Comparisons to John Kennedy Toole's A Confederacy of Dunces are not without merit, though Michael Malone's Handling Sin is closer to the mark. Its similarity to these contemporary classics aside, Cooper's novel is not at all derivative. David Pitt
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About this edition

• Publisher: Bancroft Press
• Publication date: 2007
• ISBN 10: 1890862509
• ISBN 13: 9781890862503
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 259