Ignatius Rising: The Life of John Kennedy Toole

In Ignatius Rising, Rene Pol Nevils and Deborah George Hardy present the first biography of John Kennedy Toole, a work based upon scores of interviews with contemporaries of the writer and acquaintances of his mother, Thelma, as well as unpublished letters, documents, and photographs. Known variously as "Ken," "Tooley," and "John," Toole is revealed to have been many things: a coddled only child; an academic prodigy; a soul tortured by conflicting feelings for his mother and about his sexual identity; a fun-loving cut-up, a master of mimicry, and a conversationalist nonpareil; an impeccable, popular college teacher; a straitlaced constant worrier by day and a back-street blues devotee at night; a writer who cherished the many nuances of his native city, New Orleans; and a man ultimately depressed, overweight, hard-drinking, promiscuous, and mad.

By now, the tale of Toole's sprawling comic novel of New Orleans, A Confederacy of Dunces, lives on as a modern literary legend. A young novelist writes what he thinks is his masterpiece, is rejected by a famous New York publisher, and commits suicide only to be published posthumously and win the Pulitzer. But in this almost hagiographic account, first-time authors Nevils and Hardy reveal a story that is not quite so simple. Raised in New Orleans by a mostly distant and later mentally disturbed father and a clinging mother, Toole developed the love of reading early. When he finished Confederacy, he sent it to Simon and Schuster, where the famous Robert Gottlieb championed the manuscript and encouraged Toole to make some changes so that the book would be more publishable. Toole refused, asked for the manuscript back, and eventually descended into depression and paranoia, blaming Gottlieb for the novel's failure. After his death, his mother urged Walker Percy to publish Confederacy. The rest is history. Here, mother and son seem to have stepped right out of the Southern Gothic of a Tennessee Williams play, but this is a sad tale of one family's descent into despair and lonely ascent into posthumous fame. Recommended for most collections, especially where Confederacy is popular. Henry Carrigan, Lancaster, PA
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