I don't care much for coincidences. There's something spooky about them: you sense momentarily what it must be like to live in an ordered, God-run universe, with Himself looking over your shoulder ad helpfully dropping coarse hints about a cosmic plan. I prefer to feel that things are chaotic, free-wheeling, permanently as well as temporarily crazy--to feel the certainty of human ignorance, brutality and folly. 'Whatever else happens,' Flaubert wrote when the Franco-Prussian war broke out, 'we shall remain stupid.' Mere boastful pessimism" Or a necessary razing of expectation before anything can be properly thought, or done, or written?A collage of writing styles and ideas related to Flaubert make this a most interesting and enjoyable novel. Barnes is an excellant writer who shows off his abilities in this book. Centered loosely around a mystery with a parrot, it is mostly wild thoughts and ideas presented by an amateur Flaubert scholar. The book is filled with sharp wit and sarcasm. It is both funny and thought-provoking. Each chapter takes the reader on an entirely new adventure that may seem to have little relationship with the surrounding chapters. But that is not a negative and keeps this book moving along whenever it starts to dive too deeply into details.
I will read more of Barnes because of his intelligence, writing ability, and largely for his fresh and fun ideas. He is a writer who really lets you feel you are with him as you read his words. Now I must go read some Flaubert.
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