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Alasdair Gray
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Lanark: A Life in Four Books Hardcover – January 1, 2003

by Alasdair Gray (Author), Janice Galloway (Introduction)
4.2 4.2 out of 5 stars 630 ratings
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From its first publication in 1981, Lanark was hailed as a masterpiece and it has come to be widely regarded as the most remarkable and influential Scottish novel of the second half of the twentieth century. A work of extraordinary imagination and wide-ranging concerns, its playful narrative conveys at its core a profound message, both personal and political, about humankind's inability to love, and yet our compulsion to go on trying. With its echoes of Dante, Blake, Joyce, Kafka, and Lewis Carroll, Lanark has been published all over the world and to unanimous acclaim. This collector's edition -- deluxe four-volume slipcased and numbered -- marks the novel's return to its original publisher and features a superb new introduction by the award-winning novelist Janice Galloway. In addition, it includes the author's Tailpiece, a fascinating addendum to the novel. "It was time Scotland produced a shattering work of fiction in the modern idiom. This is it." -- Anthony Burgess" Alasdair Gray is one of the most important living writers in English." -- Stephen Bernstein, The New York Times Book Review "Remarkable ... Lanark is a work of loving and vivid imagination, yielding copious riches." -- William Boyd, The Times Literary Supplement (London) "Undoubtedly the best work of fiction written by a Scottish author for decades." -- Time Out (London) "A quite extraordinary achievement, the most remarkable thing in Scottish fiction for a very long time." -- The Scotsman
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  1. Print length
    560 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Canongate Books Ltd
  4. Publication date
    January 1, 2003
  5. Dimensions
    6 x 3.5 x 8 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    184195120X
  7. ISBN-13
    978-1841951201
  8. See all details
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Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Canongate Books Ltd (January 1, 2003)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 560 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 184195120X
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1841951201
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 3.05 pounds
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6 x 3.5 x 8 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.2 4.2 out of 5 stars 630 ratings

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Alasdair Gray

Alasdair Gray

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Customer reviews

4.2 out of 5 stars
4.2 out of 5
630 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

VaDogLover
5.0 out of 5 stars Greatest Scottish Novel of the Century
Reviewed in the United States on August 23, 2020
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In the deep mud or mire of dystopian Glasgow, somewhere near the dread calendar zone, men and women, like worms, slither down tight holes searching for sunlight or food, hopefully not made from human meat and bones. Their skins are often aflame with dragon scales, and their souls are in hopes of healing as well as loving.
All the doctors are helpful, kind, misleading, and utterly untrained.
This now classic postmodern novel is thought by many to be one of the greatest novels of all time and is undoubtably the finest novel from Scotland of this century.
It is certainly brilliant and endlessly creative, astonishing in its originality, even as it steals most of the world’s literary devices and documents each theft as it’s occurring. When was the last time you read a book whose plot was driven by literary devices rather than a plot assisted by them. The book is determined to begin with Book Three and is followed by a prologue, then an Interlude, Book Two,
Book Four, an Epilogue, and a Tail Piece and all content seems made to fall in line accordingly.
Also, consider the two leading characters, Lanark, who cannot love or be loved, and Duncan Thaw, the great artist who will not fit in. It turns out, the men are one and the same, and one is an exaggeration of the other.
Make sense? Maybe not, but Gray delights in being a savant of the imagination and one of the world’s most knowledgeable academics.
Not so surprising then (though I was surprised), when the book logically concludes with a sketch of it’s author.
Let me also add, that the book is blindingly insightful in relation to the failure to love and the failure to find it, the calendar zone of the worse dystopian mindset. I kept saying to myself, throughout the book: “My God, that’s me, that’s true.”
13 people found this helpful
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Sarah Hoit
4.0 out of 5 stars Surreal futurism and character study
Reviewed in the United States on August 11, 2015
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A unique and surreal read, the range of stylistic devices and tones used added interesting layers to the work and often revel the hand of the writer. The main character (the eponymous Lanark) is well developed and complex, independent of his likability or relate-ability at different points in the book. The changing landscape in location, time period, and pacing keep the reader on unsure footing, awaiting the next oddity.
2 people found this helpful
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Kineen2
5.0 out of 5 stars One in a million! An extraordinary Reading and Life experience.
Reviewed in the United States on May 9, 2019
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I loved this book! In fact I am rereading the last chapters because I have never encountered a mind like Gray’s. Plus, I couldn’t bare to put the book away. Incredible writing - he transports you to another world, a world not impossibly our own . Lanark is alive and very human. Gray’s dystopian vision coupled with the tenderest recollections of his childhood and what it is like to grow up and to love are extraordinary and boy can he write! You really care about Lanark. Read it! I have sent copies to all my friends.
6 people found this helpful
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Rumplestitskin 77
5.0 out of 5 stars Insane but always fascinating
Reviewed in the United States on May 2, 2023
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Alasdair Gray was a very strange man, but always interesting and often unexpectedly touching in his books. Love his quirkiness, his philosophical thought processes, and his illustrations.
4 people found this helpful
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Delmore
3.0 out of 5 stars A memoir embedded in an allegorical fantasy.
Reviewed in the United States on March 20, 2019
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Lanark took years to write and is really two books woven together, an autobiographical novel and an fantasy/sci-fi allegory. It's fairly interesting to read, has some good descriptive writing and the author obviously has something to say about politics, industrial capitalism, religion and other topics. In spite of its unusual structure and post-modern ending, it's not a difficult read. The "epilogue" (followed by a few more chapters) features an exhaustive list of sources and influences and a conversation between the author and his central character. That's what I mean by post-mod.

To be honest, I was more interested in the autobiographical parts of the novel. The allegory/fantasy parts were reminiscent of Kafka, but not as good. I'm not sorry I stuck it out and finished this rather long (500 + pages) book, but I didn't really love it.
13 people found this helpful
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Andrew
5.0 out of 5 stars Finally read Lanark
Reviewed in the United States on April 4, 2021
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I'll be off to.see if better heads than mine have made the comparison to The Glass Bead Game I feel like.making. this strikes.me as a.more cynical, self reflexive, humbler version of the story told therein. A Scottish rather than a.German version. And where the Glass Bead Game follows its confidence and classic harmonies right through to it's apotheosis, Lanark is steadfast in doing the.opposite, dismantling confidence and.projections of.glory the whole time. Nevertheless it sandwiches majesty next to mendacity in the most complete way to create a character and a way of encompassing its epic aims that's wholly unlike most other things I've read. I believe I'll return to Lanark again and see different harmonies in it,perhaps ironically the same experience I have of The Glass Bead Game.
6 people found this helpful
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Sam Weller
4.0 out of 5 stars Fractured Fairytales
Reviewed in the United States on June 8, 2020
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At times this novel hits the right note with its refusal to see the work be driven by linear plots and a variety of suitable characters. Instead it floats in the streams of sci-fi and the rests on the clouds of meta fiction to disrupt any such thing as an established narrative. And at other times it hits a dissonant note with its refusal to offer bridges to these two forms. Thus, there are pluses and minuses at work here. To eschew the linear narrative style helps draw back the curtain in a theatre of the absurd mirroring at work in fiction. Minuses, it's difficult to be comfortable in one's assigned seat when the play begins to swirl around cosmic uncertainty and kaleidoscopic phenomenology. Sometimes dwelling in cosmic existentialism is not only challenging—it’s also exhausting.
9 people found this helpful
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Ninjah
5.0 out of 5 stars How Can I Give This Book 6 Stars?
Reviewed in the United States on October 6, 2021
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This is one incredible book. It won't be a "simple read." It's going to make you think. It's going to make you feel ways, at times. It's going to be a book you want to tell people about.
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Top reviews from other countries

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F
1.0 out of 5 stars One of the most boring novels I've ever come across
Reviewed in Italy on February 23, 2024
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A waste of time, money and paper.
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scrogel
5.0 out of 5 stars El mejor libro de la historia
Reviewed in Spain on February 2, 2019
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Este libro, no está, desgraciadamente, traducido al español. Aún así, merece la pena aprender inglés para disfrutarlo.
Una obra de arte.
2 people found this helpful
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Freddy
5.0 out of 5 stars Not for everyone, but I love it
Reviewed in Germany on January 20, 2018
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A very strange, but beautiful book. The reader is confused right from the start and is left to wonder what he is reading till the last part.
It defies categories and is definitely not for everyone, but for those who enjoy the surreal and are willing to read a 500 page book without knowing what it is about, I strongly recommend it.
3 people found this helpful
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Craig White
5.0 out of 5 stars Lanark - The Book That Writes And Reads Itself!
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 13, 2016
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you often pick it up in book shops, you hear folk saying what a difficult book it is, you put it back down. you know you'll repeat the exercise frequently, and you'll wish you had the will and intellect to read, understand and enjoy this book, which people have made you frightened of. then, after years of this behaviour, you will buy it twice in two days.
which i did, the first copy as a christmas present for my son, the 2nd, the day after, for £2 in a charity shop, when i decided that i couldn't wait for him to get through it so i could scadge a loan of it. well, i wasn't going to let him read it first! unthank goodness i did! this is truly one of the great scottish novels, years in the writing, greatly considered, utterly compelling, and has the quality attached to it that makes you read slower toward the end, because you don't want it to. a mesmerising, towering achievement of a book. unthanks mr. gray!
the tale is a simple one and a complex one, and an emotional one as it details the life of lanark/duncan thaw through his failures (many) and triumphs (few, but inspiring). these take place in two distinctive settings and times, creating some of the most skillfully written science fiction in the process. the 'glasgow' books are written with great care and obvious love, with a nod to james kelman in their creation. i can't think of greater praise. i'm not going to wrestle with the guts of the story, the why's, the how's, the where's, etc., as it's covered more than ably by other reviewers, and in the actual book, of course. it's important, however, to say that you don't have to be scottish to read and enjoy it, just read and enjoy it!
4 people found this helpful
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im2s
5.0 out of 5 stars 傑作
Reviewed in Japan on August 5, 2004
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Grayの最高傑作というだけでなく、20世紀に英語で書かれた偉大な小説の一つと目されている作品。全体は4部に分かれ、自伝的な2部と、ディストピア小説的な2部を中心として構成されている。基本的な語りは直線的だが、何故か第3部から開始されたり、本当の結末以前に作者が登場しての結末が置かれたりと、実験的な装いもあるが、決して難解ではない。小説の中に一つの世界が構築され、小説を読んでいる間、その中に棲みこんでしまうこととなる、希な小説の一つ。広く読まれることを期待する。そのためには翻訳が必要かもしれないが。
3 people found this helpful
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