The Book of Ebenezer Le Page (New York Review Books Classics)

by G.B. Edwards

Book Overview

Ebenezer Le Page, cantankerous, opinionated, and charming, is one of the most compelling literary creations of the late twentieth century. Eighty years old, Ebenezer has lived his whole life on the... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1590172337
• Release Date: July 2007
• Publisher: NYRB Classics
• Length: 400 Pages
• Weight: 1.02 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.0" x 0.9" x 5.3"

Customer Reviews

A big-hearted novel about a little-known time and place

I have long had a fascination for islands and count among my memorable experiences times spent on them and meeting the people who live there. It often amazes me how the geography of these small areas of land surrounded by open sea can expand in the minds of island residents to seem much larger than they in fact are. This psychological phenomenon must be due in part to the density of memory and history compacted within such confining natural boundaries.G.B. Edwards' novel captures exactly that experience. It takes place on Guernsey, an English-speaking island with French cultural roots, and it embraces in its many pages the lifetime of one man. Born into the attitudes and values of the Victorian era, he's a very singular man, living alone, often cranky and difficult but his heart filled with yearning. His whole life has been transfigured by a boyhood adventure that leaves him stranded at high tide with a dearly loved friend on a chunk of rock offshore. The island confinement is intensified in the years of German occupation during World War II. This seldom-told chapter of British history is depicted with absorbing detail and considerable suspense, as diminishing supplies of food and fuel, the constant threat of harsh treatment by the occupiers, and the sense of being "abandoned" by the British government make resistance difficult. Like others who have written reviews here, I was enthralled by this big, well written book and was reluctant to see it end. I heartily recommend it as both an engaging story with a rich cast of vividly drawn characters and a window into a time and place that are little known to the rest of the world.

Nothing like being alive

These are the fictional memoirs of Ebenezer Le Page, who writes about his life from the time he is a young boy to present, possibly till the day before he died. At a first glance, he led a very uneventful life, in that he never left his island, and was a simple farmer and fisherman. However, this is an example of how human nature is endlessly fascinating: the little and big fights between the members of his family, his observations, in retrospect, about what went wrong with this and that other person, the what ifs, his love life, his mom, his devoted sister, the horrible German occupation of Guernsey, and finally his decision over who would be the heir of his money and land. This is one of the best books i've read this year. There is so much history, insight, wisdom and humor in these pages that makes this one of those must-read-at-all-costs books. I would love to go to Guernsey and visit the sights.

Delightful. Insightful. Poingnant & Cantankerous!

I loved this book, me! I grew up on that little island, barely 5 miles long and 4 miles wide, but a whole country unto itself! The place defies the physics of Geography! It's tiny, but it's vast too. Like the story of our friend Mr. Ebenezer Le Page, the simplicity of the lives of the inter connected characters, colourful and quirky, defies the closeness of the shores. GB Edwards' posthumous writings capture the essence of the folk and the place as well, possibly better, than any book about anybody, anywhere. I highly encourage anyone who reads this story to find out as much about Guernsey as possible, perhaps even go there (visit Victor Hugo's house), then read it again for the first time. Utterly enchanting! Haunting! Simply brilliant!

?There may have been stranger literary events,??

There are some books which seem predestined to disappear into literary obscurity. Yet "The Book of Ebenezer Le Page" continues to enjoy a sort of charmed life and I'm very glad of it. The story unfolds on the island of Guernsey, in the Channel between Britain and France. Its character are therefore subjected to the influences of both countries, giving rise to such quaint observations as, "in 1066, when we (the Guernseymen) conquered Great Britain...." The island's patois is used throughout the book and there is a sense of locality which can only be gained (apart from having lived there) by those intimate with the small change of French argot.Some marvellous things about this first and only novel include the voice of the narrator and the obscure life of its author. A Guernseyman who left the island to live in England, G. B. Edwards remained unknown in literature despite having earned a small income from play writing for many years. During his years outside Guernsey, he lived in a series of small English seaside towns, finishing in Weymouth where he died. Weymouth is the nearest place one can be to Guernsey on the English mainland. Some great sadness kept him from returning to his homeland but scarcely ever, it seems, from thinking about it. Such is the quality of the narrative voice in the novel, which contains always a trace of lament. Yet it is very much a joyful book, in a typically dour, island sort of way. It is essentially a celebration of life and we, removed from the times by fifty to a hundred years, are given a privileged view of a corner of the world we would hardly expect to know at first hand. In any case, it is a world now passed. In his 1981 introduction to the book, John Fowles remarks, "There may have been stranger recent literary events, but I rather doubt it." It is just this oddness which makes me suspect that the book will one day slip into the mist. In the meantime, while it continues to be published, I can only recommend that readers continue to pay the small price for this unique yet hardly provincial masterpiece.

Climbing into a life completely different from your own.

I first read this book after ordering it from the Common Reader catalog several years ago. I found the life and times recreated in it to be more real than the life around me at the time I read it. All of the characters breathed and dreamed and sweated like real people, and yet they lived a life as different from Middle American as could be. Somehow the differences made the similarities seem the more remarkable. I would recommend this to anyone who enjoys climbing into a life completely different from their own and remembering the past of the characters as though it was a part of their own past.