6.8 /10 1 Votes
Language English Pages 464 pp Originally published 2009 Country Australia Genres Literary fiction, Novel | 3.4/5 Goodreads Media type Print (Hardback) ISBN 978-1-926428-14-7 Preceded by His Illegal Self | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Publisher Hamish Hamilton (Australia)
Knopf/Doubleday (US)
Faber & Faber (UK) Publication date 2009 (Australia)
2010 (US & UK) Nominations Booker Prize, National Book Award for Fiction Similar Peter Carey books, Literary fiction books, Social class books | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Peter carey parrot and olivier in america
Parrot and Olivier in America is a novel by Australian writer Peter Carey. It was on the shortlist of six books for the 2010 Man Booker Prize. It was also a finalist for the 2010 National Book Award.
Contents
The book, according to its publisher, is "an improvisation on the life of Alexis de Tocqueville", and focuses on Tocqueville's trips to the United States. The novel mimic's this life with the fictional character, Olivier de Garmont, to the life of Tocqueville, to help the reader explore Tocqueville's life. The titular "Parrot" is Garmont's secretary, which New York Times reviewer Thomas Mallon describes as "Dickensian" character, and a guardian of Garmont as they explore the American environment.
While Carey was developing the novel, an extract was published as: Carey, Peter (Autumn 2009). "Parrot". Granta (108): 245–284.
Critical reception
New York Time Reviewer Thomas Mallon did not think the novel as a whole was very successful, though the style followed the quality of Carey's other working describing the novel as "replete with expressed feeling, if too wittily contrived for actual passion" and describes the novel as well written with each sentence "matchlessly robust".