Fool
A Novel
-
-
4.6 • 200 Ratings
-
-
- $14.99
Publisher Description
“Hilarious, always inventive, this is a book for all, especially uptight English teachers, bardolaters, and ministerial students.”
—Dallas Morning News
Fool—the bawdy and outrageous New York Times bestseller from the unstoppable Christopher Moore—is a hilarious new take on William Shakespeare’s King Lear…as seen through the eyes of the foolish liege’s clownish jester, Pocket. A rousing tale of “gratuitous shagging, murder, spanking, maiming, treason, and heretofore unexplored heights of vulgarity and profanity,” Fool joins Moore’s own Lamb, Fluke, The Stupidest Angel, and You Suck! as modern masterworks of satiric wit and sublimely twisted genius, prompting Carl Hiassen to declare Christopher Moore “a very sick man, in the very best sense of the word.”
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Here's the Cliff Notes you wished you'd had for King Lear the mad royal, his devious daughters, rhyming ghosts and a castle full of hot intrigue in a cheeky and ribald romp that both channels and chides the Bard and "all Fate's bastards." It's 1288, and the king's fool, Pocket, and his dimwit apprentice, Drool, set out to clean up the mess Lear has made of his kingdom, his family and his fortune only to discover the truth about their own heritage. There's more murder, mayhem, mistaken identities and scene changes than you can remember, but bestselling Moore (You Suck) turns things on their head with an edgy 21st-century perspective that makes the story line as sharp, surly and slick as a game of Grand Theft Auto. Moore confesses he borrows from at least a dozen of the Bard's plays for this buffet of tragedy, comedy and medieval porn action. It's a manic, masterly mix winning, wild and something today's groundlings will applaud.
Customer Reviews
Outstanding fun
Great Shakespeare fun
Dark humor; Well Played
A story that kept a grin on my face from beginning to end, this story has great humor and a grand amount of shag to boot. If you’d like to try Christopher Moore’s stories, this is a great first read
Bawdy Bard Brutally but Brilliantly Burlesqued
Moore tackled Shakespeare's King Lear right into the mud and gave it a 'right good sodding'. Moore is irreverent and brilliant and crude and erudite all on the same page. Full of hilarious anachronism, bawdy humor, and quick-witted word play The Bard himself would be proud of, he somehow manages to squeeze in some actual ideas about power and the things it does to people.
Fool is a bit like what one could expect if the creators of Monty Python, and Black Adder met up with Eddie Izzard and they all got drunk together and decided to rewrite Shakespeare without the iambic pentameter. Or maybe what Shakespeare would write today for an HBO / BBC production. Lots of nudity, gratuitous sex, violence, and twisted plots all set in a beautiful, albeit historically inaccurate time period.
This book is for twisted people who want to laugh at the world, themselves, and love language. Or at least love foul language mashed in with all the inappropriate witty remarks.
Moore takes liberties with the plot of King Lear but really, it wasn't like Shakespeare created it of whole cloth.... The book reminded me of just how crude the Bard could be (and Moore has some wonderful expletives of his own) and how history was malleable to him. It is rare a book that can make me laugh out loud and leave me with line after line running through my head. I gave up highlighting passages I liked because by the third chapter it was looking like a textbook from a freshman who had no clue how to highlight only the important points because everything seemed important - everything here was funny.
Now, I say all this with caution. This book, this humor is not for everyone. Like, "fundamentalists" of any ilk. Or people who don't get Shakespeare (you missed the humor in Hamlet????). Or people who can't laugh at the true absurdities of life. Or people who who keep a cuss jar. Or anyone who believes in censorship.... or can't laugh about sex.... or well, you get my drift. No? (I typed in bloody perfect f****** French.)