Flaubert's Parrot

After listening I still dont know much about Flaubert and his parrot remains an enigma

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3 people found this helpful

A wonderfully woven narrative

Julian Barnes is superb & in my lifetime, always has been. A writer of great emotional and intellectual intelligence who tirelessly researches his subject and is not found wanting in detail. I enjoy his story telling every time! Richard Morant as the narrator of Flaubert’s Parrot, moves seamlessly from English to the intermittent yet frequent phrase in French. Very enjoyable!

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Never Abridge A Parrot!

Would you listen to Flaubert's Parrot again? Why?

Imperative! But only, always and ever the UNabridged version.

Who was your favorite character and why?

Why, the parrot, of course.

Have you listened to any of Richard Morant’s other performances? How does this one compare?

Listen to everything this man has narrated, starting with the next Barnes.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

And twice over. It only takes 7 hours - less than some ferry crossings!

Any additional comments?

There is an ABRIDGED version available, read by … the author himself. Don’t be tempted to avoid some of the Flaubert by going for the beastly cut version. Why it was ever made is beyond me. I got it by mistake, and almost gave up on the entire book, because thus shortened it lost the pith of its detail that it depends on for its buoyancy. Was it edited in this way by Barnes himself? Doesn’t he see it utterly defeats the illustration of how a novel IS all its detail (providing it’s well written, of course) and only by its detail gives us that which remains elusive. He must do! So it’s an experiment, aha! An experience in what you CANNOT do to a novel. Ingenious! But avoid it if you can, anyway, if you’re short on time with an ever-growing list of novels to get through (unless you are a Barnes scholar). For the rest, all I can add, pardoning his attempt is that, it is well-known some authors are just not good narrators) and notably of their own work (I bring William Golding to mind). (Barnes reads other people’s work quite adequately, so pick one of those instead if you want to familiarise yourself with his voice - which is always an added bonus once you have become a Barnes-fan…)

The bits about Flaubert in Flaubert’s Parrot are like studying the brushstrokes of a painting. Step back and see the whole. A poor rendition (copy or postcard) of a work may cloud our appreciation or give it, alternately, a special significance. But it is the meaning we value most as a shared experience, and which takes us to its source, in the writer.
As if only meaning can rescue us from our isolation. As if only truth matters. In cases of death or betrayal this often becomes life-saving, but not always available…. We may turn to the novel for consolation. Misery shared is misery halved. Factual errors or the lack of real evidence become fairly irrelevant, we trust the work as a whole. It cradles us between its covers. It expands us in a Novel World.

Conclusion. Well, from my accidental experience of comparing the abridged to the unabridged version we learn, apparently, curiously, real lives can be abbreviated in monographs (like Flaubert’s) but fictitious ones (like Braithwaite’s) cannot. They depend on the novel in its entirety for their existence until you have lifted them out successfully to lead lives of their own in your reality.

Interesting fact: Madame Bovary , as was the custom, was first published as a serial in the newspaper…. Fact living side by side with fiction again. A perfectly common marriage. With interchangeable roles?

Read Artful by Ali Smith for continued musings on this path of the nature of artfulness that is story telling, that is living in a world of language. But also Yann Martell might - incidentally - tickle your curiosity for Flaubert in his Virgil and Beatrice.

Never forget Flaubert’s Parrot was written way back in 1984, and may this testify to a certain timelessness that goes into a great novel. This was before the days of internet, virtual reality, global communities, blogs that frame every person’s life as a valid narrative, and concerns how to distinguish fact from fiction, or how real any given event in time is unless it’s shared. How can anything about Flaubert can be so Avant-Garde?.... Maybe, only anything with Flaubert in it is Avant-Garde!

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21 people found this helpful

Engrossing and enjoyable

I found this a really interesting and unusual listen. I don’t know much about Flaubert’s life, but I felt like I learned a lot about him from this diverting novel. I feel that not having read Madame Bovary might be a handicap in understanding this, but I got by without knowing anything about his other works.
This is an intriguing and ruminative novel, mostly focused on the more interesting little details of Flaubert’s life. I found the ending unexpectedly satisfying too! Morant reads the story really well, with some lovely intonation and cadences.

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1 person found this helpful

Wow! Fantastic. Couldn't read myself away

Listened to it right through in a day. So much more than a novel. It is really several treatises rolled into one. Lots of profound thinking on important subjects. I read 4 or 5 novels by Julian Barnes in the 1980s but not this one. I think I got much more out of it as an audio book than it I had faced the printed page. It made appreciating the layers of the narrative much easier. Great book!

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Excellent

What a wonderful writer. Made Flaubert’s life so interesting. The reading of the book was flawless

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Not my cup of Tea

I have read other books of Barnes.
I liked them very much but this one was not in my taste

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1 person found this helpful

rambling unstructured monologue

Could not finish, best part was the picture of the Amazon parrot on the front. This is rambling and repetitive, overall the author has has given up on any narrative structure and padded with gusto.

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1 person found this helpful