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The 21/2 Pillars of Wisdom
 
 
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The 21/2 Pillars of Wisdom (Paperback)

by Alexander McCall Smith (Author)
3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
RRP: £8.99
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Frequently Bought Together

The 21/2 Pillars of Wisdom + The Comfort of Saturdays (Isabel Dalhousie 5) + The Careful Use of Compliments: Careful Use of Compliments v. 4 (Sunday Philosophy Club)
Total RRP: £24.97
Price For All Three: £15.32

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Product details

  • Paperback: 400 pages
  • Publisher: Abacus (11 Nov 2004)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0349118507
  • ISBN-13: 978-0349118505
  • Product Dimensions: 19.8 x 12.8 x 3 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 46,080 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Product Description

Review

'There is something almost divinely appealing about the way Alexander McCall Smith writes about daily life in Botswana ... it is hard to think of a contemporary writer more genuinely engaging ... his novels are also extremely funny: I find it impossible to think about them without smiling' Craig Brown, Mail on Sunday

Product Description

Alexander McCall Smith, best-selling author of The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency, has turned his hand to humour. The delightful result is a creation of comic genius. For in the unnaturally tall form of Professor Doctor Moritz-Maria von Igelfeld, we are invited to meet a memorable character whose sublime insouciance is a blend of the cultivated pomposity of Frasier Crane and of Inspecteur Clouseau's hapless gaucherie. Von Igelfeld inhabits the rarefied world of the Institute of Romance Philology at Regensburg, a world he shares with his equally tall and equally ridiculous colleagues, Professors Florianus Prinzel and Detlev Amadeus Unterholzer. Their unlikely adventures are described in three deliciously funny instalments: Portuguese Irregular Verbs, The Finer Points of Sausage Dogs and At the Villa of Reduced Circumstances.
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Customer Reviews

7 Reviews
5 star:
 (2)
4 star:
 (2)
3 star:
 (3)
2 star:    (0)
1 star:    (0)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
3.9 out of 5 stars (7 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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27 of 27 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Gentle comedy from a bygone age, 8 Feb 2005
By P. R. Rustage - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
Although this book is set in roughly contemporary times the style and character of the work harks back to a gentler age. The comedy is subtle and restrained rather than laugh-out-loud, the characters are the aimiable types one could find in Wodehouse or Jerome. In fact, had this been written 50 years ago it would have been a prime candidate for filming as an "Ealing comedy".

The three novellas collected in this volume chart the progress of von Igelfeld through a series of unlikely escapades in his home town of Regensberg, Switzerland, Venice, Ireland, England and finally South America. In each case his insouciant academic view of the world is never displaced by the real life events taking place around him. Even being caught up in a revolution in Colombia isnt enough to stop him worrying whether a rival professor is using his desk back at the University.

This is bathos at its best, each of the characters blissfully unaware of the comedy they are in. No wisecracks or one-liners, no slapstic or satire - just slghtly foolish people trying hard not to be.

The book is a real treat. Refeshing and funny.

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11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful humour - engaging hero, 25 May 2006
By M. I. R. Clarke "ian clarke" (northern ireland) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)      
While this comic trilogy is unlikely to raise belly laughs it is a lovely picaresque exercise in social comedy and mild farce featuring the rather woolly minded and gauche Professor von Iglefeld. McCall Smith's deadpan style enable us to accept the Prof's amazing misguided adventures where he gets into all kind of Meldrew-like scrapes with south-american revolutionaries, irish farmers, acadmic rivals and colleagues. As previous reviewers have mentioned, this is understated satire and gentle bathos, more akin to bygone times eg Ealing Films - there's no bad language or graphic violence and minimal innuendo. It's also quite different from his Detective Agency / 44 Scotland Street stuff. I hope Prof Iglefeld has many more adventures.
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27 of 30 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Better than Precious, 29 Mar 2005
By A Customer
I received this book for Christmas and hadn't noticed it before.
Having previously read three of the No1LD series, and becoming a bit tired of the characters, I approached this with caution. How could this be any good when all the marketing millions were being diverted to Precious and Botswana? THIS TRILOGY IS BETTER. This deserves to be in the limelight - it is the funniest book I've EVER READ - EVER. The tale about the impromptu speech in the second novello was hilarity at it's very best. This has restored my faith in the author and I'm currently resuming my journey through Botswana. Buy it, borrow it, read it.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars A gem for someone familiar with academia, particularly in the German speaking world
This book is very different and in no way connected to the No.1 Ladies Detective Agency.

It is a separate book, not connected to any of the author's previous series... Read more
Published 3 months ago by AK

3.0 out of 5 stars Different, definitely different
I found this book a very different read to McCall Smith's other novels. It trundles along and has some wonderful comic moments but overall failed to hit the spot in the same way... Read more
Published on 9 Aug 2007 by Bookworm

3.0 out of 5 stars For me, curiously memorable......
.
....although not that enjoyable a read. After greatly enjoying The "Ladies' Detective Agency" books, this came as a bit of a let-down for me. Very different. Read more
Published on 4 July 2005 by Big Ben

3.0 out of 5 stars Gently amusing - instantly forgettable
This is the sort of book that makes a train journey pass very nicely - though you probably won't remember what it was about by the time you make it through the ticket barrier... Read more
Published on 27 May 2005

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