Beatrice and Virgil
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Review
It's a masterpiece, no question. --Reader's Digest
Beatrice and Vigil is an outstanding intellectual achievement. --The List
'Provocative and fiercely brave' --John Boyne, author of The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas
'Imaginative and innovative novel' --Financial Times
'An explosion of ideas that keeps the pages turning' --Independent on Sunday
A masterpiece, no question --A.N. Wilson
Audaciously original, never less than engrossing --Daily Telegraph
An explosion of ideas that keep the pages turning...a wild, provocative novel --Independent on Sunday
Those spell-bound by Life of Pi will find much to love in Yann Martel's new work of fiction...A thought-provoking delight --Marie Claire
This unsettling book punches well above its weight, posing difficult philosophical questions and debating the nature of historical memory. Martel is incapable of writing a dull sentence...never less than powerful and affecting
--Daily Express
Beatrice and Vigil is an outstanding intellectual achievement. --The List
'Provocative and fiercely brave' --John Boyne, author of The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas
'Imaginative and innovative novel' --Financial Times
'An explosion of ideas that keeps the pages turning' --Independent on Sunday
A masterpiece, no question --A.N. Wilson
Audaciously original, never less than engrossing --Daily Telegraph
An explosion of ideas that keep the pages turning...a wild, provocative novel --Independent on Sunday
Those spell-bound by Life of Pi will find much to love in Yann Martel's new work of fiction...A thought-provoking delight --Marie Claire
This unsettling book punches well above its weight, posing difficult philosophical questions and debating the nature of historical memory. Martel is incapable of writing a dull sentence...never less than powerful and affecting
--Daily Express
Product Description
This is the story of a donkey named Beatrice and a monkey named Virgil. It is also the story of an extraordinary journey undertaken by a man named Henry. It begins with a mysterious parcel, and it ends in a place that will make you think again about one of the most significant events of the twentieth century. Once you have finished reading it, it is impossible to forget.
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33 of 35 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Like Yann Martel himself, Henry is a Canadian author whose second book - which features wild animals - has become both a critical success and a wildly popular bestseller. He then struggles for five years with his next book, which is about the ways that the Holocaust is represented in literature. He thinks he has found a fresh approach to tell the story, but his publisher, editor and agent unanimously reject it. Henry and his wife move away and he takes a break from writing. He starts working in a café, takes up the clarinet and joins an amateur theatrical group. One day he receives a package containing a short story by Flaubert (in which many animals are killed) together with an extract from a original play featuring a discussion between two characters: Beatrice and Virgil. An accompanying note reads: "I need your help". This prompts him to track down the author, an elderly taxidermist (also named Henry) who lives in the same city. Taxidermist Henry has been working on his play for 40 years, but isn't satisfied with it. At this point the plot slows down, and the play becomes the focus of the story.
So Beatrice and Virgil is a strange combination of what seems to be a highly autobiographical memoir with a not-very-compelling mystery, that centres on a play about a donkey and a howler monkey living on a striped shirt - which is itself a fairly laboured and obvious metaphor for something else. And that's the biggest issue for me. When I started reading the book I felt that it was stimulating, riddled with clues and associations, that it was operating on so many levels. But as I read on, I increasingly felt that I was being bludgeoned with the same heavy-handed metaphors over and over. I don't want to give away too much about the ending - which comes abruptly - other than to say that I found it both heart-breaking and blatantly manipulative.
This is a hard book to rate because it's difficult for me to separate my emotional response from my intellectual one. My emotional response is that I didn't like it - I loved the beginning, but hated it by the end - and yet, I still think it has impact and merit. It's interesting and ironic for me that a book which is about an author who wants to write a new and meaningful take on the Holocaust but fails, ultimately becomes a failed attempt to write the very same thing.
Having said that, many parts of the book are beautifully written and are a pleasure to read. Martel has a gorgeous turn of phrase - for example, there's a lovely description early on about the German language and how it differs from the English language.
Beatrice and Virgil would be a perfect book for bookclubs because it's a quick read, it has so many layers and almost everyone is likely to have a strong response - whether positive or negative - to it. There's plenty I'm sure that I didn't "get" - including why the two central characters share the same name.
So Beatrice and Virgil is a strange combination of what seems to be a highly autobiographical memoir with a not-very-compelling mystery, that centres on a play about a donkey and a howler monkey living on a striped shirt - which is itself a fairly laboured and obvious metaphor for something else. And that's the biggest issue for me. When I started reading the book I felt that it was stimulating, riddled with clues and associations, that it was operating on so many levels. But as I read on, I increasingly felt that I was being bludgeoned with the same heavy-handed metaphors over and over. I don't want to give away too much about the ending - which comes abruptly - other than to say that I found it both heart-breaking and blatantly manipulative.
This is a hard book to rate because it's difficult for me to separate my emotional response from my intellectual one. My emotional response is that I didn't like it - I loved the beginning, but hated it by the end - and yet, I still think it has impact and merit. It's interesting and ironic for me that a book which is about an author who wants to write a new and meaningful take on the Holocaust but fails, ultimately becomes a failed attempt to write the very same thing.
Having said that, many parts of the book are beautifully written and are a pleasure to read. Martel has a gorgeous turn of phrase - for example, there's a lovely description early on about the German language and how it differs from the English language.
Beatrice and Virgil would be a perfect book for bookclubs because it's a quick read, it has so many layers and almost everyone is likely to have a strong response - whether positive or negative - to it. There's plenty I'm sure that I didn't "get" - including why the two central characters share the same name.
12 of 13 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
I barely know where to start with this book. I actually finished it over a week ago but wanted to wait a while to collect my thoughts about it and see if they are any clearer after some consideration. They aren't: I am just as confused.
I was so desperate to get my mitts on this book: Life of Pi is one of my all-time favourites and I have developed a huge crush on tigers since reading the book. When I saw the cover and the blurb for Beatrice and Virgil I was practically cartwheeling round the room in anticipation of my my brand new crush on donkeys and howler monkeys. It's by Yann Martel. It's got animals in it. What's not to love?
I will attempt to describe the plot now: There is an author called Henry who has had two really successful books out and he has just written a third which gets panned by his publishers. In the first 20 pages of this book I learned more about flip books than I ever realised I cared (and am assured that I still don't). Henry throws his toys out of the pram and moves to another (unamed) city to live off his previous royalties and do things like join an orchestra and a drama group without writing another thing. One day he ets a strange letter from a man also called Henry. The letter contains a chapter of a play that Henry #2 has written and asks Henry #1 for help. Coincidentally, Henry #2 lives in the same city where Henry #1 has just moved to so Henry #1 decides to pay him a visit and finds that Henry #2 lives and works as a taxidermist. The rest of the book flits between the play that Henry #2 has written which is about a donkey called Beatrice and a howler monkey called Virgil who live on a striped shirt, and the two Henry's meeting to discuss the play.
I have to be honest that if I hadn't loved Life of Pi so much I'm not sure that I would have wanted to carry on reading after the first 50 pages. I say wouldn't have wanted to, but even so I probably would have as I felt strangely compelled to keep reading. The play with the animals was a very obvious metaphor for the holocaust and there were times when I felt like I was being beaten over the head with them. The ending too: I can't decide whether I was being blatantly manipulated or whether Martel has just done a really good job of making me feel what the holocaust was ultimately all about - I was heartbroken at the end, both with the ending of the play and with the Games for Gustav which was a series of "Sophie's choice"-like questions about what would you do in this situation?
I think that this is possibly the first time I have been so unsure how to score a book. It certainly wasn't a book I necessarily enjoyed but was it a good book? I really don't know whether it's complete trash or absolute genius. Having said that, I do still keep thinking about it.
I was so desperate to get my mitts on this book: Life of Pi is one of my all-time favourites and I have developed a huge crush on tigers since reading the book. When I saw the cover and the blurb for Beatrice and Virgil I was practically cartwheeling round the room in anticipation of my my brand new crush on donkeys and howler monkeys. It's by Yann Martel. It's got animals in it. What's not to love?
I will attempt to describe the plot now: There is an author called Henry who has had two really successful books out and he has just written a third which gets panned by his publishers. In the first 20 pages of this book I learned more about flip books than I ever realised I cared (and am assured that I still don't). Henry throws his toys out of the pram and moves to another (unamed) city to live off his previous royalties and do things like join an orchestra and a drama group without writing another thing. One day he ets a strange letter from a man also called Henry. The letter contains a chapter of a play that Henry #2 has written and asks Henry #1 for help. Coincidentally, Henry #2 lives in the same city where Henry #1 has just moved to so Henry #1 decides to pay him a visit and finds that Henry #2 lives and works as a taxidermist. The rest of the book flits between the play that Henry #2 has written which is about a donkey called Beatrice and a howler monkey called Virgil who live on a striped shirt, and the two Henry's meeting to discuss the play.
I have to be honest that if I hadn't loved Life of Pi so much I'm not sure that I would have wanted to carry on reading after the first 50 pages. I say wouldn't have wanted to, but even so I probably would have as I felt strangely compelled to keep reading. The play with the animals was a very obvious metaphor for the holocaust and there were times when I felt like I was being beaten over the head with them. The ending too: I can't decide whether I was being blatantly manipulated or whether Martel has just done a really good job of making me feel what the holocaust was ultimately all about - I was heartbroken at the end, both with the ending of the play and with the Games for Gustav which was a series of "Sophie's choice"-like questions about what would you do in this situation?
I think that this is possibly the first time I have been so unsure how to score a book. It certainly wasn't a book I necessarily enjoyed but was it a good book? I really don't know whether it's complete trash or absolute genius. Having said that, I do still keep thinking about it.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
I rarely review books, confining myself to classical music but as soon as I'd finished this I felt compelled to register my vote. Like many a previous reader and reviewer, the only reason I a) bought this book, b) persevered with reading it was because I had read, taught, studied and admired "Life of Pi". I have never encountered such a dour, pointless, tedious farrago of nonsensical ideas in my life; the novel is all the more incomprehensible for being written by such a talented author. A previous reviewer has it right by characterising the book as 95% boring and 5% shocking; the grinding, right-on relevance of the message is appreciable only "retrospectively" after you have been repulsed and shocked by the moments of graphic brutality, hideous cruelty and gratuitous violence. Yes; of course I know that is what typified the Holocaust and that evil is inevitably banal compared with the transcendence of goodness - but the reiteration of wickedness and banality does not a work of art - or indeed a tolerable novel - make.
Even worse is the author's ultimate insistence on hitting you over the head with the "message". Rather than being content with providing an intelligent reader with subtle clues, towards the end Martel elaborates a literal, clodhopping explanation of how to decode the novel. We get it, OK? The earnestness with which he does so just about negates any appreciation I might have had for his craft.
Certain critics and pseuds are falling over themselves to hail this as a profound masterpiece; I can only suggest that you obtain a copy - for heaven's sake don't waste money on it as I did - and read for yourself if you suspect me of poor judgement, prejudice or ignorance. I assure you I wanted to like the book, having been so impressed by "Pi". Try, by all means - but don't say I didn't warn you.
Even worse is the author's ultimate insistence on hitting you over the head with the "message". Rather than being content with providing an intelligent reader with subtle clues, towards the end Martel elaborates a literal, clodhopping explanation of how to decode the novel. We get it, OK? The earnestness with which he does so just about negates any appreciation I might have had for his craft.
Certain critics and pseuds are falling over themselves to hail this as a profound masterpiece; I can only suggest that you obtain a copy - for heaven's sake don't waste money on it as I did - and read for yourself if you suspect me of poor judgement, prejudice or ignorance. I assure you I wanted to like the book, having been so impressed by "Pi". Try, by all means - but don't say I didn't warn you.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Thought-provoking, awful, boring, interesting, brilliant!
I have to agree with most of the reviews on here, although a mixed bag, they perfectly describe this book. Read more
Published 8 days ago by supermummy
Did not enjoy but it has stayed with me
I didn't enjoy this book at all. Well, I enjoyed the beginning but by the last 60 pages I was desperate for it to end. Read more
Published 1 month ago by SW4reviewer
Very disappointing
Henry is a writer with a couple of successful novels behind him but his latest attempt to wow the literary world is bombing badly. Read more
Published 2 months ago by boingboing
Not for the squeamish
I have read the reviews which complain of the derivative nature of the book ('Waiting for Godot' etc)and the obviousness of the allegory, and I concur to a degree, but Martel does... Read more
Published 5 months ago by David Williams
A real literary challenge
Beatrice and Virgil are a Donkey and a Howler Monkey. Beatrice and Virgil is a novel about the holocaust. Read more
Published 5 months ago by Mick Read
Horrible
I bought this having read (and loved) Martel's 'Life of Pi' hoping it would be equally magical. What a contrast it was! Read more
Published 7 months ago by pinky
stunning
I finished this book in one night because I just couldn't stop turning the pages. The description in the book is mesmerizing, Yann Martel has a real gift for description, just the... Read more
Published 8 months ago by Eve Rashed
A Jigsaw Puzzle
Once all the pieces fall together at the end of this remarkable book, I was left with no choice, but read it again immediately. Read more
Published 9 months ago by Simone Valmont
Another mad Martel
Incredibly inventive both in conception and narration. A play within a story within a book within a book. Read more
Published 9 months ago by Cary
Surprise
It is difficult to believe that this book was written by the same author that wrote The Life of Pi, one of my favourite books of all time. This book was shockingly awful. Read more
Published 10 months ago by A. Freeman
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