An improbable work of genius: A Confederacy of Dunces

I thought I read a lot until I met J_,  We were working in the same law firm and introduced to each other as great readers.  But J__ leaves me in the dust.  For example, when we first met and ran over lists of our favorite books she added, "And of course, I love A Confederacy of Dunces."  That brought me up short.  I hadn't even heard of A Confederacy of Dunces.  If you haven't, get ready.  This isn't one great story, it's two.

The story behind the story is incredible.  This young guy, John Kennedy Toole, writes a comedy novel during the late 50's and early 60's while he's serving in the army.   He comes home to his native New Orleans, starts teaching and finishes the draft of the book.   He finishes the novel and ships it off to one of the best publishing houses at the time, and the editors indicate they are interested in publishing it.  (This rarely happens to a first-time novelist).  The book needed work, they said, but they're interested.   So Toole goes back and revises.   And revises.  And revises.  After almost a decade of rewrites and revision, the publisher turns the book down.   All that work, for nothing.

Mr. Toole tried to keep going but his other work wasn't picked up and the rejection and symptoms of mental illness began to eat away at his life.  He lost his confidence, fought with his folks and dropped out of his Ph.D. program.  One January, he ran away from home.  In March, he took his own life.

Mr. Toole's mom was one of those overwhelming, indomitable Southern Women.   Armed with her son's comic manuscript and a will of galvanized steel, she made the lives of publishing executives hell during the 1970's, showing up in their offices and demanding they publish her dead baby's masterpiece.  Eventually she ran into Walker Percy, (probably literally) that great southern writer, who was teaching at Loyola at the time.  She coerced him into reading the pages. The college's press published the book, A Confederacy of Dunces, in 1980.  It won the Pulitzer Prize in '81, (something unheard for a posthumous work)  and has been studied, translated, loved, celebrated and adapted ever since.  How about that for a back story?

Now for the book itself:  ACOD has one of the most unlikely anti-heroes in American Literature, Ignatius J. Reilly.   This 30-year old New Orleans native is a self-absorbed, lazy, fat, slob who plays the lute, pontificates about his bodily functions to anyone and hates everything about the modern world, especially the idea of supporting himself.  He sponges off his mother  and spends his days criticizing the world and telling his mama what to do.   When somebody asks Ignatius what he does to help around the house, he has this to say:

"I dust a bit...in addition, I am at the moment writing a lengthy indictment against our century.  When my brain begins to reel from my literary labors, I make an occasional cheese dip."

To him, this is sufficient.   To the rest of the world, it is not.  Eventually his mother develops enough of a backbone to insist her college-educated son get a job, any job, to help out with the family finances and Ignatius manages first to get a clerical position in a pants factory (how someone can cause that much trouble while avoiding even the semblance of work is amazing) and afterwards, the chance to sell hot dogs from a push cart in the French Quarter.  Pity the owner of the pushcart.  Ignatius returns the cart at the end of the day, sans hot dogs and sans profits but with some new aromas around his person.  Can you guess what happened to the hotdogs?

I haven't mentioned half of the incidents in the book or the wonderful supporting characters (I love Myrna Minkoff, the beatnik activist who lives to be arrested and is the closest thing Ignatius has to a girlfriend) because I don't want to spoil it.  But I will say the book is acknowledged as a masterpiece and one of the few works of literature that really captures New Orleans.  I'm not surprised.  The town seems to me to be a lot like our hero here: strange, eccentric, a bit fool-hardy, not of this world and despite all efforts, unbeatable.  Ignatius and NOLA are made for each other.

So follow me and J__ and open the pages of A Confederacy of Dunces or take a walk in the City That Care Forgot .   Pick up some wine-cakes from the bakery in D. H Holmes and remember to tie up your box with a lute string.  But  watch out for any Oliver Hardy lookalikes under the clock outside the store, especially if they stand beside a food cart.  Those guys can turn your world upside down.