2025 Reading Challenge discussion

This thread is to discuss the John Kennedy Toole book, A Confederacy of Dunces.

Pages: 416 pages

Length: 1 month

Participants: AnnaG, Lindsay, oshizu, Regina

Everyone reads at their own pace during a Buddy Read. Because participants can be at different parts of the book at different times, it is extremely important to mark spoilers so that the book is not ruined for someone who is not as far along as others!!!

Mark spoilers by placing {spoiler} before the text and {/spoiler} after the text but use the < and > instead of the { and }.


Happy Buddy Reading!

Thank you for setting up this thread for us, Kadijah Michelle!

Ladies, I will be starting this book today!
Looking forward to talking about it with you. :D

Hi everyone, hope you don't mind if I crash the buddy read too. I've been seeing Confederacy of Dunces everywhere in the UK after Billy Connolly said it was his favourite book of all time.

The edition I've got hold of has an introduction from Walter Percy which describes the main character as "Aquinas gone to pot, transported Louisiana... gaseous rages and lunatic adventure." I'm looking forward to getting started.

AnnaG wrote: "Hi everyone, hope you don't mind if I crash the buddy read too. I've been seeing Confederacy of Dunces everywhere in the UK after Billy Connolly said it was his favourite book of all time."

Nice to have another buddy reader, AnnaG!

I've reached the 34% point of this book, corresponding to the end of Chapter Five.
I'm finding this book both very hilarious and somewhat disturbing.
Here are a few uninformed questions:
(view spoiler)[1. What's with Ignatius's fixation with his "valve." Is that a metaphor for something else which has flown over my head?
2. May I assume that a few of the characters (even Ignatius) represent archetypal caricatures familiar to residents of Louisiana? I obviously don't recognize any of them.
3. Regardless of #2 above, I'm enjoying the colorful characterizations. Are the blatantly racist comments about "coloreds" supposed to be tongue in cheek?
4. Dialogue: Does it capture local speech of a particular era or does to prevail in present-day New Orleans? (hide spoiler)]

I'm so glad to finally get a chance to read this book!

To answer your questions, here's a bit of background info.

(view spoiler)[
1. It refers to an actual valve, so Ignatius is a rather bilious and gassy guy. :)

2. Ignatius's character is based on a Medievalist professor Toole encountered at USL in Lafayette. The other characters are true New Orleans types and many of them still exist.

3. Toole wrote the book in the 1960s, so "coloreds" would have been the polite term for African Americans in the south.

4. Toole's mother gave music lessons out of their home and Toole spent a lot of time listening to the various dialects and accents. He became a very skilled mimic. Yes, some of those accents are still around, but many of us have more homogeneous American-ish accents. I am often asked where I am from by locals because I don't have a typical New Orleans accent. You might find these short videos illuminating in regard to accents. For the record, I don't sound like any of these people!

https://youtu.be/tpFDNTo4DNg

https://youtu.be/k7IeY7fTWUo
(hide spoiler)]

In response to your responses, Regina:
(view spoiler)[1. Yes, I ended up googling "pyloric valve" soon after reading and found a definition with a very "helpful" picture, haha. It just kills me how he's even got his manager Gomez considering the state of Ignatius' valve.
2. I'm rather relieved to hear the author didn't loosely base IR on himself. Did that medievalist prof make a cameo appearance at the end of a chapter, reading IR's caustic letter to him and wondering whatever became of IR? That prof's office hours couldn't have been popular if he also had "valve issues."
3. I wasn't referring to the term "coloreds," but the rest of the racist remarks about them by IR. Poor Jones!
4. Thank for the info and links about dialects/accents. I have been reading the speech out loud to enjoy them more. I'll revisit your post later today to watch your linked YT vids! (hide spoiler)]

Thanks for taking the time to answer my questions!

I've reached the end of Chapter 12.
(view spoiler)[I haven't enjoyed the second third of the book as much as the first third, perhaps because Ignatius doesn't change--pompous, condescending, self-absorbed, and delusional. Some of the situations are hilariously depicted, like that failed factory mutiny and equally unsuccessful political rally.
The author's imagination for characters and scenarios was unbelievably rich. (hide spoiler)]

I agree with you oshizu

(view spoiler)[ The book is hilarious and there are scenes that I am really enjoying, but at the half-way point, it is felling like none of the characters are progressing. I tend to like my books to be very "plotty" so I am finding it a bit off-putting that no-one is learning from their mistakes and becoming a better person or moving along in a plan. I suppose the stasis of Ignatius' life is the point of the story.

On another note, is anyone else feeling a bit queasy about the portrayal of working class people in this novel? (hide spoiler)]

Hi guys. So, I am a really sucky buddy reader. I just wanted to weigh in even though I haven't finished (though I have read the book many times).

(view spoiler)[The book isn't perfect, but it does perfectly capture the essence of New Orleans in the 1960s. I agree that Ignatius is rather static as a character, but I guess that doesn't bother me all that much.

As for Toole's portrayal of working class people, I guess it's a bit off-putting if you're not from New Orleans, but I get where you're coming from. To me, it's just how we talk about and make fun of ourselves. And Ignatius is meant to be an unrepentant snob, even though he comes out of the working class. (hide spoiler)]

AnnaG wrote: "I agree with you oshizu

The book is hilarious and there are scenes that I am really enjoying, but at the half-way point, it is felling like none of the characters are progressing. I tend to like ..."

@AnnaG
I was browsing the internet a few weeks ago on the subject of flanerie and was surprised to discover Ignatius being mentioned in passing as a modern-day flaneur.
(view spoiler)[Not in the sense that he strolls the city landscape but in the sense that he is an urban observer, serving as our lens for viewing particular urban moments in time.
I can appreciate Ignatius Reilly better from that perspective--he doesn't represent the author's perspective so much as a mindset in 1960s New Orleans. Hah, he still annoyed me, lol. (hide spoiler)]

Regina wrote: "Hi guys. So, I am a really sucky buddy reader. I just wanted to weigh in even though I haven't finished (though I have read the book many times).

The book isn't perfect, but it does perfectly capt..."

Thank you for coming back to this buddy read to share your thoughts, Regina.
My mind frequently revisits this book, wondering what about it rubbed me the wrong way. I feel the book serves up a particular type of humor that I've yet to learn to appreciate.
Did you love this book after your first read? Or was it a book that grew on you through subsequent reads?
Or perhaps I'm too much of a social outsider to the protagonist's world? Hmmm....

I loved it the first time. In some ways, it's a niche read and very much tied to New Orleans' social stratification in the 60s. For example, since Toole was college educated, he might have been perceived by his working class family as being as obtuse as Ignatius--as having "book learning" vs. sense. So is Ignatius a cautionary tale for Toole himself? Possibly.

Mostly, though, I feel like the book is a kind of love letter to New Orleans and to all the wonderful characters one might have encountered here at the time.