I would rate a few of the stories contained in this book with five stars, but other stories bring the total rating down to 3 stars. These are the stories which I would rate with 5 stars: "The Concentration City", "Chronopolis", "Thirteen for Centaurus", and "The Sublimiminal Man". "The Concentration City" is set somewhere in the future where somethings taken for granted now have long been forgotten. Hence things have to be reinvented and rediscovered. Because of "development" however, there are almost insurmountable barriers to reinvention. "Chronopolis" is a fascinating story of how using watches and clocks became illegal. "Thirteen for Centaurus" is about a space station supposedly travelling to a distant gallaxy. "The Sublimiminal Man" is aptly named because it is about exactly what the title says. The rest of the stories just didn't hold my interest. Some of them were very complex while others were simple but didn't have a good plot. Indeed, some of the stories had no plot at all. As far as climax is concerned, none of his stories had a climax. Most of his stories should be read mainly for the experience as opposed to a good meat and potatoes story. One thing about J.G. Ballard is that he certainly is very imaginative and creative.

Ballard is one of the great "conceptualizers" of modern literature. The premises of his stories are the most immediately striking thing about them. Sometimes the story doesn't live up to the expectations he creates, but this is probably because he sets the bar so high.

In any case, whether a Ballard story is a total or only a partial success, it invariably provides plenty of food for thought. Three of them--"The Overloaded Man", "The Drowned Giant", and "The Garden of Time"--rank among my all-time favorites for their perfect fusion of speculative and mythic qualities. The more technology-based stories ("Concentration City", "The Voices of Time") are more interesting for their ideas than their execution.

In the introduction to this volume, Anthony Burgess hits on the central importance of Ballard's work: "Ballard considers that the kind of limitation that most contemporary fiction accepts is immoral... Language exists less to record the actual than to liberate the imagination." If you agree, buy this book.

This is some of the best short fiction ever written. A friend of mine lent me this book. I've read a lot more J.G Ballard because I loved this book so much, but have not enjoyed Ballards other work as much. Most of the stories deal with mans struggle to cope - with technolgy, with fear, with relationships with change etc. There's a few dud stories but most are home runs.

One Hand Clapping is a short, bitterly humorous look at a British working-class couple who strive to win a fortune on a TV quiz show, then spend their fortune in a rather peculiar fashion. Although Once Hand Clapping was written in the early 1960s it's satiric message still rings true. I loved it.

However this novel is not for everyone. Firstly, the book has a very British feel about it. Much of the wording is not used in America, and is even distinctly old-fashioned here in England. But otherwise One Hand Clapping is an excellent introduction to the brilliant world of Anthony Burgess.

I can't disagree more with something12_2@hotmail.com. *One Hand Clapping* is a terrific book, funny, profound, and memorable. Although I read it several years ago, I think about quite a lot -- and remember quite vidily the pleasure I had reading it. I highly recommend it to both Burgess fans and those who have never read him, or think he just wrote *Clockwork Orange.* It's good to see *One Hand Clapping* is still in print.

_One Hand Clapping_ is that rarity, a truly rousing, dark, and hilarious satire which doesn't get lost by either being too silly or too dark. An excellent compromise, with an added bonus of not uncovering its true point until around the end. I can't help but sympathize with poor Burgess, whose entire life's work was defined by _A Clockwork Orange_; while that, too, is an excellent work, he has so much more in his back catalogue than just droogs and moloko!

i quite enjoyed burgess dissing of the faults and quirks of '1984'.

the only fault with 1985 is that it tells a unprobable story in a totally un-living fashion. his misinterpretations of syndicalism and anarchism also disturbs me. a good idea, but poorly executed.

Burgess' 1985 is really two works combined. The first is a series of essays and self-interviews that discuss Orwell's 1984. These are a great group of essays that really throw some light on Orwell's novel. Anyone who likes 1984 should read these essays. The second half is a novella of Burgess titled 1985. The dust jacket gives the impression that it is supposed to be a sequel of sorts. It isn't. It is a dystopia that takes place in 1985 (written in 1978) and is supposed to be a (more) possible scenario at the time. It isn't very entertaining, and a lot of ideas, characters, themes, etc aren't fleshed out the way they should be. But I suppose that could do with the shortness of the story. And Burgess should have been more careful with his title. Burgess's 1985 isn't a frightening or as well written as Orwell's 1984, and Burgess drawing the reader to make a comparison only hurts his story. After the novella is a short chapter on Worker's English (WE) which is Burgess' version of Newspeak. The problem is that WE isn't used much in the story, is really nothing more than a little slang, and I understand that Burgess only has the chapter/essay because of Orwell's explanation of Newspeak, but it is dull and unnecessary. Then Burgess finishes out the volume with another self-interview which discusses the possibility of his future. All this in only 270 pages. Still, the discussion of Orwell's 1984 that the first half is comprised of is excellent and the book is worth finding, if only for that.

A stunning book which I stumbled across completely by chance - and one which throws new light on two of the last century's most important novels: Orwell's 1984 and Burgess' own A Clockwork Orange. I have long been an admirer of both books, but this book is fascinating in that it goes some way towards clarifying the moral stances which have long remained open to interpretation in the two previous books. Unusually for a popular work, the book combines a devastating critique of 1984, with it's own fictional riposte (the 1985 of the title). The latter part being particularly interesting as a reminder of just how pertinent the issue of syndicalism was in the days just before the resurgence of rampant lassez faire.

Some great, informative writing, especially for musicians - Burgess was a composer as well as a writer. I am a music reviewer and I found his essays on Shaw and music most informative, ditto on Ravel. I do not think too much of the editorial comments, however.

Whenever I retrospect Anthony Burgess, I am reminded of one comment: 'While the estimation of Burgess as a novelist is controversial, that as a critic is appreciated almost unanimously.' Probably its truth becomes more and more apparent as time passes. Among his well-known critical writings are "The Novel Now" and its development "99 Novels: the Best in English since 1939", and what is more, the collections of journalistic pieces: "Urgent Copy", and "Hommage to QWERT YUIOP". This one, collected poshumously, was published in paperback form this year.

According to the preface, the editor saw Burgess when he came to his university when he was wrestling with a doctorial dissertation and feeling bored. He was fascinated by Burgess'freewheeling character, wide reading and total recall. He says that Burgess could speak on almost all the themes of literature and recite endlessly 'The Wreck of the Deutchland' by G. M. Hopkins.

The construction is: (1)Genius Loci--invocation to a land (2)In Our Time--current pieces (3)Ars Poetica--on general culture (4)Anniversaries & Celebration--a lament for the dead

As is usual, the topics vary widely from Orson Wells, Marylin Monroe to Thatcher. I am a little surprised that I read it through easily as if I were carried by the stream of music of a 4-part Motet. The word 'infinitely readable' also appears on the back cover. His writing seems like a later Mozart.

Anthony Burgess wrote this light novel about the same time he was doing the first volume of his autobiographical "Confessions" entitled Little Wilson and Big God. If you don't know the autobiography, maybe you can take The Pianoplayers as straight fiction. But I had read Little Wilson and Big God, not once but twice, by the time I picked up this novel in a outdoor bin in Sydney. And I was hopelessly aware that much of what I was reading was pure autobiography, loosely repackaged with scarcely a fictive figleaf to disguise it. In this case the figleaf is a change of sex. The narrator is Ellen Henshaw, an elderly woman born in the same place and year as Burgess. Henshaw's father, a dreamy, easygoing musician who plays piano accompaniment in fleapit movie theaters, is merely Burgess's dad pulled down a rung or two on the social scale. The first two-thirds of the book follows Ellen and her father on their picaresque social and sexual adventures, through bedsitters, cinemas, pubs and music halls in Manchester and Blackpool. Finally old Mr Henshaw collapses and dies after three weeks of a marathon performance at the piano keyboard. This brings the quasi-autobiographical section to an end. Ellen now goes back to school--first to a convent, then to a school for whores on the Continent. She tells us sketchily that she amasses a pile of money, returns to England, then gets back on The Game as an enterprising madam with a international string of brothels. Somehow a son appears in the story and has farcical adventures of his own, mostly involving an obese mother-in-law who dies on holiday in Italy and gets strapped like a piece of luggage to the roof of a Fiat. Burgess is very inventive with his heroine's career path--for example, she is lured from convent to courtesanarium by a high-class Belgian strumpet disguised as a nun--but he doesn't have the stamina to develop the characters' turns of fortune into something more than a series of whimsical digressions. I was irritated by the cavalier attitude of an author who seems to be asking me to care about characters who are presented as little more than cartoons.

This book is wonderfully written by a master of the English language. He writes in the first person as a girl, a difficult task for any man, but if you didn't know who wrote it, you wouldn't be able to tell. The book is entertaining and very interesting. It is very different from "A Clockwork Orange," which is good because here you can see the author's depth and amazing ability.

One of the most interesting parts of this book is the section on Burgess's most famous novel, A Clockwork Orange. Stinson presents incredibly interesting evidence against some of the people following John J. Tilton, who wrote about very controversial ideas that related to the novel. Stinson turns out to be a credible and logical source against Tilton, regardless of who is right. When writing a research paper about A Clockwork Orange (highly reccomended) Stinson should, along with Tilton, be one of the first sources to cite. If you are interested in criticisms of Burgess's work, a great book to add to your library.

In "Any Old Iron" Burgess gives us an entertaining tale of a Russo-Welsh family across the decades since the late 1800s. The story is ostensibly about families, war, love, birth and death - the usual fare, in other words. He also, being Burgess, gives us a liberal dose of foreign language, word play and (as a subtext that had me re-reading this book a number of times) a carefully camouflaged and delightfully off-kilter retelling of the Arthurian legend. This book is worth reading if only to see if you can tell which character was the "Fisher King" and which others correspond to legend - a marvellous romp through the legendary and the prosaic. Add in Burgess' sly wit and taste for word play and you have a story to settle down with for any number of evenings. I'm sorry Burgess is gone - we shan't see his like again for a long, long time!

I've read only a few Anthony Burgess novels (the Orange and _1985_) and keep meaning to get around to _Earthly Powers_ and _A Dead Man in Deptford_, but I sure enjoy his nonfiction. The two volumes of his autobio come highly recommended. And this.

A pity this big ol' honkin' collection of essays is out of print. Burgess covers the waterfront, from other writers ("Mailer may need money to pay his multiple alimony, but he is selling out to something nastier than commerce") to travel ("There is, I see too late, an _estofado de toro_ on the menu, and I wonder if this is at all like the son-of-a-bitch stew (pizzle, testes and all, washed down by Bloody Marys) that I met in Montana"); from the English language to the conducting and composition of classical music (each of which he did a bit). There is plenty of wit and penetrating insight to spare.

Most memorable are his pieces on fashion designers and models ("A friend of mine slept with one of these exquisite dream figures and said it was like going to bed with a bicycle"), the state of Utah (the last place he got "stinking incapable drunk ... because there are no bars"), and a great predecessor:

"Recount Jane Austen's life to a class in an American university, and there will be unseemly expressions of shock that she knew nothing about life, man, meaning like well never slept with a guy and like well was stuck in a crappy old house without an icebox.... That I am twenty years and [biographer] Lord [Cecil] David thirty-five years older than she was when she died represents no advantage to either of us. We have not produced her novels. She remains not only a formidable artist who would demolish both of us (well, certainly me, if she thought me worth demolishing or even taking notice of) in a couple of lines; she testifies formidably to the truth that we have nothing to teach her about how to live the good life, nor, for that matter, anything to teach her age about the right true end of civilization."

One last wonderful item, from the essay "Thanatic": "While I am being personal I may as well offer my father's dying words, which I heard clearly: 'Bugger the priest. Give me a pint of draught Bass.' "

This is supposed to be part 3 of the trilogy, but it has VERY little to do with the first 2 books (both of which I loved, BTW). The only thing in common with the first books is the character of Titus (who was a baby in the first book, so was really only a character in the second book). The first 2 books spend much (most) of their time in a rather enchanting world that is confined to a castle and the immediate area around it, yet none of this book takes place there. Much more disturbing, however, is this volume takes place in a VERY different time period than the first two books. The first 2 take place in a castle that is lit by candles and has no visible technology (the only thing that is described that was invented in the last 800 years is a reference to "guns", but they are never used and it is unknown how primitive the "guns" would be). In this book they have cars, airplanes(!), and tiny self propelled spy devices that don't even exist today! (Not to mention helmets that give you superhuman strength, and other fantastic future things - it goes from medieval castle straight to comic-book future). It is not even internally consistant - one woman flys an airplane to visit a ruin she last saw during a failed expedition to explore the unknown in one direction, an expedition that had to quit because of an unpenatratable LINE OF TREES (were the trees so tall they could stop the airplanes?). At "plot" is barely in existance, and has lots of people doing things for no rational or decernable reason (really a stark contrast to the first 2 stories, which went to some length to give you insight into the characters).
Read the first two, then skip this one - it is not only not in their league, it will actually diminish your remembered enjoyment of the first two.

I enjoyed this book very much but it IS rather different from the preceding novels (Titus Groan, Gormenghast), which are really complete as a pair. Though related it is not necessary to have read them in order to follow the action of this story.

Young Titus Groan, Lord of Gormenghast after his Father's assassination and the death of the villainous Steerforth, decides to set out to see something of the world beyond the eccentric traditions of his decayed and moribund realm. He finds a decaying and eccentric city, where he makes some allies as he becomes a nine-days wonder.

Peake excelled at depiction of a monstrous and decaying world filled with wierd eccentrics. If you like that kind of thing, you'll love this book!

To my knowlege, the only thing ever written in the English language that even comes close is Shakespeare's latter plays. For characterization, plot, description, humor, pathos and sheer gothic intensity and wonder, Peake's Gormenghast trilogy may be without parallel in all of human literature.

Read it and find out what the English language is capable of.

I'm not sure how to feel about this short book of burgess. i admire the man and his work, but you have to wonder about some of his choices. there are so many great books and authors that aren't included in his choices, though i could see the difficulty in picking one book a year. it is interesting to see how burgess' mind works, and the choices he makes, but it is only of interest of a burgess scholar.

I happened upon 99 NOVELS THE BEST IN ENGLISH SINCE 1939 last week as I browsed my library network's catalog. I devoured this book in a matter of a few hours.

The book consists of one introductory essay and 99 very brief book reviews. According to Burgess's introduction, for poetic reasons, he restricted the scope of his list to novels written after the beginning of WWII and before "the nonfulfillment of a nightmare" (l984). His definition of "novel" is narrow. For example, in his review of George Orwell's l984, he notes that ANIMAL FARM was a much greater work and goes on to state that he couldn't include it in his list because it is a fable rather than a novel. Ironically, Burgess does include William Golding's LORD OF THE FLIES and Malcolm Lowry's UNDER THE VOLCANO, both of which are allegories.

I don't agree with all of Burgess's selections, nor do I agree with everything he writes in his reviews. Regardless, his reviews are outstanding, enjoyable, often hilarious and always intellectually stimulating. Two very interesting aspects of Burgess's reviews are, first, that he sees intellectual value in everything he reads (I envy him) and, second, he finds something similar to Joyce's ULYSSES in everything he reads.

What I like best about Burgess's reviews is that I kept thinking to myself "I've gotta read that book". My list of "must reads" is now twenty-one books longer than it was two days ago.

I found this book in the early eighties, while living in New York. I loved Anthony Burgess for his erudition, his musical background, his love of Joyce, his brilliant, playful writing (Clockwork Orange) his knowledge of history and his ability to go on talk shows in the seventies and be smarter then anybody else but also completely down to earth. In the pages of 99 Novels are just those qualities.

This book -- a kind of "minute history" of literature since 1939 -- sent me scurrying into used book stores like a field mouse. His brief, paragraph long summaries of the "most influential" books since WW2 (starting with Finnegan's Wake) are provocative,funny, opinionated with a look to the long view as well. How broad was his taste? The Joyce scholar makes an argument for Raymond Chandler's Long Goodbye as the best American Novel of the nineteen fifties. He also covers Norman Mailer, Brian Aldiss, Mary McCarthy, Brian Moore, Ian Flemming, Orwell, Ballard, Huxley, Murdoch, Roth, Greene...etc.

In short, you can take this as a brilliant and unpretentious field guide from a writer who loved and knew literature and the English language quite unlike anybody else around. Burgess never lost sight of the fact that the novel is one of mankind's greatest inventions,and he proves it with this book.