Perhaps this is because there is some of Toole in Ignatius. Why am I not revolted by him? Because Toole writes about him so beautifully, with such a uniquely surprising turn of phrase and such great empathy. We are only on page 2, but already I have grown fond of Ignatius, and I remain so throughout the book, despite his faults and his hypersensitive pyloric valve which closes at the least hint of stress and leads to chronic flatulence and bloating. the outfit was acceptable by any theological and geometrical standards, however abstruse, and suggested a rich inner life. Their pleats and nooks contained pockets of warm, stale air that soothed Ignatius. The voluminous tweed trousers were durable and permitted unusually free locomotion. Stuck out on either side like turn signals indicating two directions at once. It includes a green hunting cap with earflaps which He arrives on the first page – wham! – an enormous, colourful and disruptive creature in a bizarre outfit which he considers entirely sensible. Ignatius is 30, unemployed, slothful, hugely overweight, flatulent, conceited, dependent on, and absolutely horrid to, his maroon-haired mother, with whom he still lives in uptown New Orleans. I had never come across such a repulsive hero. I came upon John Kennedy Toole’s A Confederacy of Dunces in the early Eighties, and was at once rather taken by its main protagonist, Ignatius J.
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