The Duke's Man: A Novel,Used

Product Description Historical fiction has long ranked somewhere just above romance novels and mysteries in the great chain of literary respectability, yet as David Slavitt points out in his humorous yet loving sendup of the genre, riches might be found in the most unlikely sources. The Dukes Man is, in a way, old and newa condensation and commentary and a literary mashup. The eponymous character is Louis de Clermont, Comte de Bussy dAmboise, a gentleman of the court of King Henri III of France, and the hero of Dumas threevolume historical novel La Dame de Monsoreau (1846). Dumas novel serves here as inspiration, pretext, and pretext for a commentary that veers off into numerous historical and biographical digressions, musings on narrative and the novel, and parody.Focusing on one aspect of Dumas novelthe doomed love story of Bussy dAmboise and Diana de MonsoreauSlavitt excerpts key passages, which are extended and undercut by the narrators comments. The result is a radically abridged book with its own life and verve. The first of the quoted scenes, in which the names of Bussys assailants are replaced with those of French cheeses, sets the irreverent tone for all that follows. The book pokes fun at Dumas exclamatory style and flamboyant archaisms (morbleu! pardieu!), the implausibility of the swordfights, the unnecessary contortions of the political plot, the conventional passivity of the heroine, and the coyness of his love scenes. Residing somewhere between Nabokovs Pale Fire and Quirk Books mashups (Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, etc.), The Dukes Mans blend of quotation, commentary, and fiction raises searching questions about realism and truth. Review 'David R. Slavitt writes the best sentence in America today. His remarkable fluency is an unfailing delight as he deconstructs and at the same time brilliantlyreconstructs Alexandre Dumas' novelLa Dame de Monsoreau. Here, in all fullness, are Louis de Bussy d'Amboise, 'the brave Bussy'; sixteenthcentury France; an interrogation of the historical novel as a genre; and a witty but profoundly felt, unobscured look at the pure wickedness of our 'human' species. What more could anyone ask for?' Kelly Cherry, author ofThe Woman Who'David Slavitt's book is, at one and the same time, an examination of the ways and means of the writing of historical romances, a quiet and often wise meditation on the life and work of Alexandre Dumas, and an intellectual, irreverent, even Francophobic romp through Dumas'La Dame de Monsoreau. It is as much a delightful pageturner as any novel by that prolific Gallic talespinner himself.' R.H.W. Dillard, author ofWhat is Owed the Dead About the Author David Slavitt is a poet, translator, novelist, critic, and journalist. He is the author of more than seventy works of fiction, poetry, and poetry and drama in translation. His latest translations are Orlando Furioso by Ludovico Ariosto (2009), Boethiuss The Consolation of Philosophy (2008), Lucretiuss De Rerum Natura (2008), and Joachim du Bellays The Regrets (Northwestern University Press, 2004). David Slavitts other recent works include Get Thee to a Nunnery: A Pair of Shakespearean Divertimentos (1999), Metamorphoses (for the stage, with Mary Zimmerman, Northwestern,2002), and George Sanders, Zsa Zsa, and Me (Northwestern, 2009).