The Book of Ebenezer Le Page - Critical Reception

Critical Reception

• "This extraordinary book" full of "wonderful writing": "To read it is not like reading but living", William Golding. Re Ebenezer himself, Golding wrote: "Nor are simple adjectives adequate... there is epic stature in his individualism". The following December (1981) Golding chose it as his "Book of the Year" in The Sunday Times.

• "The achievement is so intense and universal that the reader is rendered speechless... G.B. Edwards has succeeded in writing a great novel"; Isobel Murray inThe Financial Times.

• "A startingly original book", The Times.

• "strong compelling voice, both wily and innocent... it holds the reader in an Ancient Mariner grip throughout this brilliant, unusual, and, very sadly posthumous novel"; Nina Bawden in The Daily Telegraph.

• "G. B. Edwards, The Book of Ebenezer Le Page. I'd never heard of it. A friend gave it to me. It was written by an 80 year old recluse on the island of Guernsey, which is where it's set, and it seems to me one of the greatest novels of the 20th century. Really." - Stephen Orgel

• "There may have been stranger recent literary events than the book you are about to read, but I rather doubt it", John Fowles in his 1981 Introduction; reprinted in Wormholes (1998).

• "a breathtaking novel": Newsweek.

• A masterpiece....One of the best novels of our time....I know of no description of happiness in modern literature equal to the one that ends this novel. Guy Davenport, The New York Times Book Review.

• Hubert Juin in Le Monde praised the freshness of the style and the literary ambitions of the author, whose aim was to speak rather than to write (Une sorte de miracle tient à l'étrange fraîcheur de l'écriture, sinon à la merveilleuse naïveté de l'écrivain. G.B. Edwards ne songe pas à écrire, il a pour seul impératif de parler).

• Maurice Nadeau, in the preface he wrote for the 1982 French edition, greeted the book as an exceptional achievement (exceptionnelle réussite), a subtle, complex and magical blend of space, time and humane sufferings and joys (un subtil, complexe et magique composé d'espace, de temps, de souffrances et de joies humaines).

• "Recently reprinted by New York Review Books, G.B. Edwards' novel tells the story of a Guernsey man who lived through the Nazi occupation of Britain's Channel Islands into garrulous old age. His reminiscence is couched in a musical Guernsey English that follows circular paths through past and present to delve into island secrets and sagas. Great stuff." Seattle Times

• "There is a rare wholeness about The Book of Ebenezer Le Page. You get the entire man, in a way that isn't usually within the gift of literature to procure... I have read few books of such wide and delightful appeal.... is vast fun and vast life, a Kulturgeschichte... It is ‘the book of’ in the prosaic sense that Edwards’s character speaks it (or writes it in his three big notebooks bought for 18/6 at ‘the Press Office in Smith Street’ in St Peter Port); but also ‘of’ in the sense of ‘made into’. It is Ebenezer made into a book. (Bohumil Hrabal’s Too Loud a Solitude comes to mind, with its paper-baler who is finally baled up himself.) William Golding put it admirably when he said: ‘To read it is not like reading but living.’ It is like reading with no clothes on." (Michael Hofmann, London Review of Books, 24 January 2008).

• "Quaint. Fascinating. Unique. Queer…The Book of Ebenezer Le Page is a eulogy for a way of life." The Los Angeles Times (Valerie Miner)

• "It reads like Beethoven’s Ninth…Coated with sea salt, its crannies spilling wildflowers, Edwards’s book still roars like some huge shell held, cutting, against your ear." The Atlantic.

• "Imagine a weekend spent in deep conversation with a superb old man, a crusty, intelligent, passionate and individualistic character at the peak of his powers as a raconteur, and you will have a very good idea of the impact of The Book of Ebenezer Le Page…It amuses, it entertains, it moves us… Ebenezer’s voice presides over all and its creation is a tremendous achievement." The Washington Post (Doug Lang)

• " rare find…it is unique–a first novel that resists all categories–and it overflows with the sense of life…It’s chief virtues are a story rich in human connection and a marvelously seductive language…For those who cherish style, it is also good to hear a fresh novelist’s voice telling the old story of the passions, generosities, and greeds that battle in us all." —Chicago Tribune (Lynne Sharon Schwartz)

• "G.B. Edwards, who died an unknown in 1976, constructed his novel out of the patterns of daily life–countless teas, lovers’ quarrels, accounts of friendships and the signs of change as Guernsey reluctantly assumes the characteristics of progress. The results are enchanting."The Washington Post (New In Paperback)

• "A remarkable achievement!…The book’s voice and its methods are so unusual that it belongs nowhere on our conventional literary maps."—John Fowles

• " knowing and beguiling chronicle of life on the English Channel isle of Guernsey…This deceptively plain-spoken story of a man’s years passing in review before him struck me, when I first read it in 1981, as a beautifully crafted job of writing. Upon rereading it recently, I redoubled my liking and admiration for both Ebenezer and Edwards."Ivan Doig, Christian Science Monitor.

• "The Book of Ebenezer Le Page, by G. B. Edwards, is an inexhaustible book I never tire of giving. It is literally one of a kind, a work with no precedent, sponsorship, or pedigree. A true epic, as sexy as it is hilarious, it seems drenched with the harsh tidal beauties of its setting, the isle of Guernsey…For every person nearing retirement, every latent writer who hopes to leave his island and find the literary mainland, its author–quiet, self-sufficient, tidy Homeric–remains a patron saint." —Allan Gurganus, O Magazine

• "The Book of Ebenezer Le Page, by G. B. Edwards, is an oddity and a great literary wonder, written in the beautiful French patios of Guernsey, one of the Channel Islands… feels intensely about everything and everyone in this deliciously rich novel of longing and love."—Archipelago

• "Here is an islander; an island man, solitary, unmarried, alienated, who describes the modern denaturing of our world. Granite quarries and tomatoes and early potatoes; but then come tourists, international companies, tax evaders, occupation by Germans, etcetera.” —The New York Review of Books

• "Books: Forced to choose, we'd pick The Book of Ebenezer Le Page by G. B. Edwards as our favorite novel of all time. The recollections of a cranky old man on the island of Guernsey, Guy Davenport of the Times wrote, when the book was first published here in 1981: ‘A masterpiece...One of the best novels of our time...I know of no description of happiness in modern literature equal to the one that ends this novel.’ Hard for us to imagine a more pleasurable weekend than one spent with Ebenezer Le Page." Manhattan User’s Guide

• "I actually went on holiday to Jersey twenty years ago and the cottage I was staying in had a copy of Ebenezer Le Page that I read while I was there. And it was absorbing, and one of my most emotional reading experiences. So when I was imagining Guernsey - the family, the way they lived and their relationships with the people around them I was sort of inspired by the way he talks about the island." Lisa Jewell (http://www.visitguernsey.com/article/102070/Author-Lisa-Jewell-writing-Before-I-Met-You-and-Guernsey)