Christie Malry's Own Double-Entry

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Johnson (1933-1973), a forgotten hero of the British avant-garde of the 1960s and 70s (he committed suicide when he was not yet 40), wrote seven wonderful novels that echo Joyce and Beckett in their intelligence, inventiveness and genius for language. It was an enjoyable read but I did feel that the concept overshadowed both the story and inner message. While some of Johnson's tactics may seem dated, his questions remain provocative, his chilly humor pointed and sharp. This was perhaps because I knew now that by the time B S Johnson had written this novel he was sensing that he had written himself into a corner (his novels weren't popular, and his publisher was going cold), and that this led to his suicide very soon afterwards. He takes up with a sexually eager young woman – think vacuum cleaners and shaving foam – known only as the Shrike.

Christie had expected to have to work hard, and to find the work both uncongenial and menial, at first. He soon strikes upon the novel idea of developing his own double-entry system, in which he engages in increasingly grandiose acts of revenge to gain credits against the debits that society owes to him, from small disappointments to large-scale frustration over the workings of society and politics in 20th-century England. Even if we understand that all is chaos, the understanding itself represents a denial of chaos, and must therefore be an illusion.Caroline Smailes (1) independent publishers (1) Interviews (4) Jack Maggs (1) Jane Rogers (1) JB shorts (2) JG Ballard (1) JM Coetzee Disgrace (1) Jo Cannon (1) Joan Didion (1) John Baker (1) John Banville (1) John McAuliffe (1) John Siddique (1) Judy Kendall (1) Just One Book campaign (14) Kanta Walker (1) Kurt Vonnegut (1) Leaf Memory (1) Libraries (2) literary criticism (2) Literary festivals (2) Literary magazines (6) Literary prizes (11) Little Monsters (1) Livi Michael (2) London Short Story Festival (2) Looking for the Castle (1) Malcolm Bradbury (1) Manchester Blog Awards (3) Manchester Blogstory (13) Manchester Book Market (1) Manchester Literature Festival (12) Manky Poets (1) Mark Illis (1) marketing books (1) marketing fiction (29) marketing novels (3) Matthew Hollis (1) Matthew Licht (1) memoirs versus novels (3) metropolitan (1) Michael Cunningham (1) Michael Ondaatje (1) Michele Roberts (2) Mike Barlow (2) Muriel Barbery (1) my reading (16) Nathanael West (1) National short story award (1) National Short Story Campaign (1) national short story day (1) networking (2) Nicholas Royle (1) Nick Royle (3) Nightjar Press (5) Niki Valentine (1) Norman Geras (1) Normblog profile (1) North West Playwrights (1) Novel progress (15) Nuala Ni Chonchuir (6) O'Leary's Daughters (1) Octagon Theatre Bolton (1) Ondt and Gracehoper (1) Open Music Archive (2) Oxfam Alderely Edge Community Book Festival (2) Oxfam Bookfest (3) Panos Karnezis (1) Peter Carey (1) playwrights and production (3) playwriting (1) playwriting schemes (2) poetry (3) Possibility (1) Power (1) Proofs (3) Prose Formation (1) Publishing (1) Quill magazine (1) Radio 4 (5) Radio 4 drama (1) radio adaptation of fiction (4) radio drama (6) Raymond Carver Competition (3) Reading (7) Reading at Manchester Jewish Museum (2) Reading group (144) Reading group Lee Langley (1) Reading group. I often think about how other people perceive me in my life, and wonder about the reality of the lives of others. I had picked up a copy of Coe’s biography of Johnson a few years ago but never gotten around to reading it, (it is big, and not knowing anything about its subject I couldn’t justify jumping it to the front of my ever-growing ‘To Read’ list). S. Johnson was the principal figure in the ’60s-’70s wave of British experimental fiction and it is said that Christie Malry's Own Double-Entry, his penultimate work, is his most accessible novel.

But we are wrong: learn, then, that there is not going to be any day of reckoning, except possibly by accident. Finance is provided by PayPal Credit (a trading name of PayPal UK Ltd, Whittaker House, Whittaker Avenue, Richmond-Upon-Thames, Surrey, United Kingdom, TW9 1EH). His family is not wealthy, and he wants to be near money so simple Christie takes a position at a bank.What compounds the despondency of this comparison is the knowledge that Christie held some sources of his life dear, which he omitted from the debits and credits. Acerbic yet funny, this is a novel which, even as it provokes laughter, will alarm and disturb as well. Possibly also the ideas of the book were now too familiar to me for it to have the same impact the second time around. In his most successful experiment, The Unfortunates­ , his unbound book-in-a-box, Johnson lets the reader configure the novel in whatever manner they wish.

It is the metafictional account of a disaffected young man, Christie Malry, who applies the principles of double-entry bookkeeping to his own life, "crediting" himself against society in an increasingly violent manner for perceived "debits". Give and take, debit and credit -- or aggravation and recompense, as he defines it for his own purposes. Thats not double entry, because its the same variable in two different events in the space time continuum. Hoy la novela únicamente debería proponerse ser divertida, brutal y corta"Eso nos dice el autor a través de uno de sus personajes y, en efecto, este es un libro divertido en ocasiones y brutal en otras, incluso divertido y brutal a la vez; es un libro donde se aúnan la brevedad del relato y la sencillez de su lectura; un libro diferente en su forma; un libro donde los personajes son conscientes de vivir en una novela y que incluso charlan con el narrador, mientras que este no pierde ocasión de provocar al lector, de incitarle (las apariencias de los personajes se dejan totalmente abiertas a nuestras preferencias, incluso escenas tan apetecibles como los encuentros sexuales son expresamente confinados a la mucha o poca imaginación del quizás decepcionado indolente lector) y hasta de comunicarle sus disquisiciones acerca de la escritura de esta novela en particular como referente de la novela en general. It seems that enough accidents happen for it to be a hope or even an expectation for most of us, the day of reckoning.

As a young accounts clerk at a confectionery factory in London he learns the principles of Double-Entry Bookkeeping. Popular Blogs: Books Brazil Dave Eggers David Foster Wallace David Mitchell Fernando Pessoa football George Saunders Grantland Guatemala haruki murakami Hay Literature Festival Italo Calvino J. The death of Christie’s mother, his love of the Shrike represented areas ‘in which the writ of Double-Entry did not run. However, he taught himself Latin in the evenings, and with this knowledge, managed to pass the university exam for King's College London.