John Irving, página 2 de 8

Auf der Laienbühne seines Großvaters in Vermont lernt William, dass gewisse Rollen sehr gefährlich sind. Und dass Menschen, die er liebt, manchmal ganz andere Rollen spielen, als er glaubt: so wie die geheimnisvolle Bibliothekarin Miss Frost. Denn wer sich nicht in Gefahr begibt, wird niemals erfahren, wer er ist

Billy Abbott, nato nel 1942, è cresciuto in una cittadina del Vermont senza aver conosciuto il padre, in una famiglia di uomini eccentrici e donne puritane. Si rende conto di essere attratto dalle "persone sbagliate" ragazzi efebici, donne mascoline, travestiti e transgender - e a occuparsi della sua educazione letteraria e sessuale è Miss Frost, la bibliotecaria. Negli anni successivi Billy attraverserà l'oceano, vedrà morire amici e amanti nell'ecatombe dell'Aids, diventerà scrittore, ritroverà suo padre. I grandi temi tipici dei libri di Irving - la ricerca di un padre mai conosciuto per svelare il mistero che lo avvolge, la profonda verità delle passioni che ci abitano, la necessità di non incasellare le persone in uno schema - danno vita a una toccante epopea sul terrore di essere diversi, e sulla felice impossibilità di essere altro da sé.

Seuls depuis la fuite de William, un organiste qui collectionne les conquêtes féminines et les tatouages, Alice et son fils partent pour l'Amérique. L'enfant grandit entre filles à matelots, chastes institutrices et imprésarios douteux. A vingt ans, Jack Burns brille au firmament de Hollywood et collectionne les femmes. Pour autant, rien ne remplace jamais le regard d'un père...

Eleven-year-old Owen Meany, playing in a Little League baseball game in Gravesend, New Hampshire, hits a foul ball and kills his best friend's mother. Owen doesn't believe in accidents; he believes that he is God's instrument. What happens to Owen after that 1953 foul is both extraordinary and terrifying. At moments a comic, self-deluded victim, but in the end the principal tragic actor in a divine plan, Owen Meany is the most heartbreaking hero John Irving has yet created.

John Irving Until I Find You is the story of the actor Jack Burns - his life, loves, celebrity and astonishing search for the truth about his parents. When he is four years old, Jack travels with his mother Alice, a tattoo artist, to several North Sea ports in search of his father, William Burns. From Copenhagen to Amsterdam, William, a brilliant church organist and profligate womanizer, is always a step ahead - has always just departed in a wave of scandal, with a new tattoo somewhere on his body from a local master or "scratcher." Alice and Jack abandon their quest, and Jack is educated at schools in Canada and New England - including, tellingly, a girls' school in Toronto. His real education consists of his relationships with older women - from Emma Oastler, who initiates him into erotic life, to the girls of St. Hilda's, with whom he first appears on stage, to the abusive Mrs. Machado, whom he first meets when sent to learn wrestling at a local gym. Too much happens in this expansive, eventful novel to possibly summarize it all. Emma and Jack move to Los Angeles, where Emma becomes a successful novelist and Jack a promising actor. A host of eccentric minor characters memorably come and go, including Jack's hilariously confused teacher the Wurtz; Michelle Maher, the girlfriend he will never forget; and a precocious child Jack finds in the back of an Audi in a restaurant parking lot. We learn about tattoo addiction and movie cross-dressing, "sleeping in the needles" and the cure for cauliflower ears. And John Irving renders his protagonist's unusual rise through Hollywood with the same vividdetail and range of emotions he gives to the organ music Jack hears as a child in European churches. This is an absorbing and moving book about obsession and loss, truth and storytelling, the signs we carry on us and inside us, the traces we can't get rid of. Jack has always lived in the shadow of his absent father. But as he grows older - and when his mother dies - he starts to doubt the portrait of his father's character she painted for him when he was a child. This is the cue for a second journey around Europe in search of his father, from Edinburgh

1954. A la cuina d'una casa de menjars d'una remota zona del nord de New Hampshire, en Danny, un inquiet noi de dotze anys, confon un moment de passió entre el seu pare i la parella del policia del poble amb un ós llegendari, i sense voler, mata la dona. A partir d'aquest moment, el noi i el seu pare es converteixen en fugitius i recorren els Estats Units mentre el policia els persegueix durant cinc dècades per venjar-se. Mentre el pare treballa de cuiner aquí i allà, el noi creix, va a la universitat, coneix l'amor i el desamor, té un fill i es converteix en un escriptor famós. Però, finalment, el vell policia localitza el cuiner i li dispara un tret. La mort del pare provoca un gran sentiment de culpabilitat a en Danny. Només la tornada als paratges de la infància li permeten retrobar-se amb ell mateix i iniciar la frase amb què comença a escriure de nou: «L'última nit a Twisted River...». Amb un to amarat d'emotivitat, marca de la casa, que li permet moments d'humor, aventures, màgia i realitat, Irving sap com fer que els lectors s'enamorin dels personatges, tan peculiars i commovedors, i gaudeixin amb la història d'un pare i un fill fugitius de la vida.

Like all extraordinary books, The World According to Garp defies synopsis, wrote the Chicago Sun Times when Garp was first published in 1978. It is a marvellous, important, permanent novel by a serious artist of remarkable powers. Garp is a book that captivates all who read it. Peopled with the most extraordinary characters you will ever meet, here is a novel that will make you laugh, make you weep, and, above all, make you think.

Hijo de un organista que un dia dejó su familia para dedicarse a la música, Jack Burns crece rodeado e influenciado por las mujeres. Ellas le ayudan a descubrir los placeres del erotismo y la sensualidad, pero también su vocación: la interpretación.

¿Recuerdan cómo devoraron en su momento Una mujer difícil, la novela en la que John Irving contaba la historia de Ruth Cole? ¿Se acuerdan del cuento protagonizado por sus hermanos Tom y Tim? ¿Y del inquietante ruido que los desperto en plena noche? Ahora publicamos ese cuento en un volumen aparte, maravillosamente ilustrado por Tatjana Hauptmann. Nada mas salir en Alemania, el semanario Stern lo ha recomendado sentenciando: "De lectura obligada para todos los seguidores de John Irving".Traducido ya a varias lenguas, El ruido que hace alguien cuando no quiere hacer ruido es el primer libro infantil publicado por John Irving. Y, a su vez, Tatjana Hauptmann ha convertido una de las historias de Una mujer dificil en un libro magico.aTom se despierta a medianoche y oye un ruido muy extraño en la casa. Su hermano Tim no lo ha oido, pues esta dormido. Tom va a buscar a su padre y, juntos, tratan de averiguar de donde procede ese ruido tan raro, tan dificil de definir...

John Irving's first picture book for children is a story excerpted from his adult novel A WIDOW FOR ONE YEAR about a little boy frightened by strange noises in the night. Little Tom tells his father that he's heard a terrifying creature that "pulls itself along on its teeth." Tom and his teddy bear timidly look around the house for whatever unspeakable horror was making "the sound of an armless, legless monster dragging its thick, wet fur." Eventually, his father points out that it's "just a mouse crawling between the walls," reassuring his son that there was no reason to be afraid. Muted pencil-and-watercolor-wash illustrations capture the shadowy world of the scared child.

The Fourth Hand asks an interesting question: "How can anyone identify a dream of the future?" The answer: "Destiny is not imaginable, except in dreams or to those in love.

Juan Diegos little sister is a mind reader. As a teenager, he struggles to keep anything secret Lupe knows all the worst things that go through his mind. And sometimes she knows more. What a terrible burden it is to know or to think you know your future, or worse, the future of someone you love. What might a young girl be driven to do if she thought she had the power to change what lies ahead?Later in life, Juan Diego embarks on a journey to fulfil a promise he made in his youth. It is a long story and it has long awaited an ending, but Juan Diego is unable to write the final chapters.This is the story of what happens when the future collides with the past.

John Irving returns to the themes that established him as one of our most admired and beloved authors in this absorbing novel of fate and memory.In Avenue of Mysteries, Juan Diegoa fourteen-year-old boy, who was born and grew up in Mexicohas a thirteen-year-old sister. Her name is Lupe, and she thinks she sees what's comingspecifically, her own future and her brother's. Lupe is a mind reader; she doesn't know what everyone is thinking, but she knows what most people are thinking. Regarding what has happened, as opposed to what will, Lupe is usually right about the past; without your telling her, she knows all the worst things that have happened to you.Lupe doesn't know the future as accurately. But consider what a terrible burden it is, if you believe you know the futureespecially your own future, or, even worse, the future of someone you love. What might a thirteen-year-old girl be driven to do, if she thought she could change the future?As an older man, Juan Diego will take a trip to the Philippines, but what travels with him are his dreams and memories; he is most alive in his childhood and early adolescence in Mexico. As we grow oldermost of all, in what we remember and what we dreamwe live in the past. Sometimes, we live more vividly in the past than in the present.Avenue of Mysteries is the story of what happens to Juan Diego in the Philippines, where what happened to him in the pastin Mexicocollides with his future.

A compelling novel of desire, secrecy, and sexual identity, "In One Person" is a story of unfulfilled love - tormented, funny, and affecting - and an impassioned embrace of our sexual differences. Billy, the bisexual narrator and main character of "In One Person", tells the tragicomic story (lasting more than half a century) of his life as a "sexual suspect", a phrase first used by John Irving in 1978 - in his landmark novel of "terminal cases", "The World According to Garp". His most political novel since "The Cider House Rules" and "A Prayer for Owen Meany", John Irving's "In One Person" is a poignant tribute to Billy's friends and lovers - a theatrical cast of characters who defy category and convention. Not least, "In One Person" is an intimate and unforgettable portrait of the solitariness of a bisexual man who is dedicated to making himself "worthwhile".

Eleven-year-old Owen Meany, playing in a Little League baseball game in New Hampshire, hits a foul ball and kills his best friend's mother. Owen does not believe in accidents and believes he is God's instrument. What happens to Owen after that 1953 foul is both extraordinary and terrifying.