The horse's mouth
by Joyce Cary · first published 1944
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2HN commenters
2010–2026first – last mentioned
100% recommend
Painter hero, the charming and larcenous Gulley Jimson, has an insatiable genius for creation and a no less remarkable appetite for destruction. Is he a great artist? a has-been? or an exhausted, drunken ne'er-do-well? He is without doubt a visionary, and as he criss-crosses London in search of money and inspiration the world as seen though his eyes appears with a newly outrageous and terrible beauty.
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Hunger by Knut Hamsun, Wait Until Spring by John Fante, Post Office by Charles Bukowski, The Horse's Mouth by Joyce Cary, The Outsider by Colin Wilson, The Price of Greatness by Arnold M. Ludwig, Touched With Fire by Kay Redfield Jamison Just off the top of my head without any ordering.
on “Ask HN: Books That Should Be Read” ↗I disagree. Many novels have great openings. "The Horse's Mouth" by Joyce Cary had me from the opening paragraph. I could say the same about "Rebecca" by Daphne du Maurier or "the Crow Road" by Iain Banks. We nicknamed "the Matrix Reloaded", the "Mattress Resprung",…
on “Every novel is boring until it isn't” ↗