Description: "The 35th anniversary edition of A Confederacy of Dunces celebrates Toole's novel as well as one of the most memorable protagonists in American literature, Ignatius J. Reilly, whom Walker Percy dubbed 'slob extraordinaire, a mad Oliver Hardy, a fat Don Quixote, a perverse Thomas Aquinas rolled into one.' Set in New Orleans with a wild cast of characters ... the novel serves as an outlandish but believable tribute to a city defined by its parade of eccentric denizens"--Dust jacket flap.
Brief description: John Kennedy Toole was born in New Orleans in 1937 and died in 1969. After graduating from Tulane University, he received a master's degree from Columbia University and taught at Hunter College, the University of Southwestern Louisiana, and Dominican College. Much of the first draft of A Confederacy of Dunces was written while he was in the army, stationed in Puerto Rico and teaching English to new recruits.
Review Quotes: One of the funniest books ever written . . . it will make you laugh out lough till your belly aches and your eyes water.-- "The New Republic"