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The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith
The Booker Prize-winning author of Oscar and Lucinda and The Tax Inspector now gives readers a hero, the malformed but ferociously wilful Tristan Smith, who becomes the object of the world's byzantine political intrigues, even as he attains stardom in a bizarre Sirkus that is part passion play and part Mortal Kombat.
422 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1994
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About the author
Peter Carey
102 books1,033 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name. Not all books on this profile are by the same author. See this thread for more information.
Peter Carey was born in Australia in 1943.
He was educated at the local state school until the age of eleven and then became a boarder at Geelong Grammar School. He was a student there between 1954 and 1960 — after Rupert Murdoch had graduated and before Prince Charles arrived.
In 1961 he studied science for a single unsuccessful year at Monash University. He was then employed by an advertising agency where he began to receive his literary education, meeting Faulkner, Joyce, Kerouac and other writers he had previously been unaware of. He was nineteen.
For the next thirteen years he wrote fiction at night and weekends, working in many advertising agencies in Melbourne, London and Sydney.
After four novels had been written and rejected The Fat Man in History — a short story collection — was published in 1974. This slim book made him an overnight success.
From 1976 Carey worked one week a month for Grey Advertising, then, in 1981 he established a small business where his generous partner required him to work only two afternoons a week. Thus between 1976 and 1990, he was able to pursue literature obsessively. It was during this period that he wrote War Crimes, Bliss, Illywhacker, Oscar and Lucinda. Illywhacker was short listed for the Booker Prize. Oscar and Lucinda won it. Uncomfortable with this success he began work on The Tax Inspector.
In 1990 he moved to New York where he completed The Tax Inspector. He taught at NYU one night a week. Later he would have similar jobs at Princeton, The New School and Barnard College. During these years he wrote The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith, Jack Maggs, and True History of the Kelly Gang for which he won his second Booker Prize.
He collaborated on the screenplay of the film Until the End of the World with Wim Wenders.
In 2003 he joined Hunter College as the Director of the MFA Program in Creative Writing. In the years since he has written My Life as a Fake, Theft, His Illegal Self and Parrot and Oliver in America (shortlisted for 2010 Man Booker Prize).
Peter Carey was born in Australia in 1943.
He was educated at the local state school until the age of eleven and then became a boarder at Geelong Grammar School. He was a student there between 1954 and 1960 — after Rupert Murdoch had graduated and before Prince Charles arrived.
In 1961 he studied science for a single unsuccessful year at Monash University. He was then employed by an advertising agency where he began to receive his literary education, meeting Faulkner, Joyce, Kerouac and other writers he had previously been unaware of. He was nineteen.
For the next thirteen years he wrote fiction at night and weekends, working in many advertising agencies in Melbourne, London and Sydney.
After four novels had been written and rejected The Fat Man in History — a short story collection — was published in 1974. This slim book made him an overnight success.
From 1976 Carey worked one week a month for Grey Advertising, then, in 1981 he established a small business where his generous partner required him to work only two afternoons a week. Thus between 1976 and 1990, he was able to pursue literature obsessively. It was during this period that he wrote War Crimes, Bliss, Illywhacker, Oscar and Lucinda. Illywhacker was short listed for the Booker Prize. Oscar and Lucinda won it. Uncomfortable with this success he began work on The Tax Inspector.
In 1990 he moved to New York where he completed The Tax Inspector. He taught at NYU one night a week. Later he would have similar jobs at Princeton, The New School and Barnard College. During these years he wrote The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith, Jack Maggs, and True History of the Kelly Gang for which he won his second Booker Prize.
He collaborated on the screenplay of the film Until the End of the World with Wim Wenders.
In 2003 he joined Hunter College as the Director of the MFA Program in Creative Writing. In the years since he has written My Life as a Fake, Theft, His Illegal Self and Parrot and Oliver in America (shortlisted for 2010 Man Booker Prize).
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 72 reviews
October 31, 2024
Carey risks much in this one and not always successfully either.
Brave, bold, highly unsettling and occasionally outrageous, this unwieldy fable charts a double territory of place, vocabulary and possibility through a vaudevillian cast of characters and events. Yet in spite of its brilliance, this maverick tour-de-force never quite achieves the magic of Carey’s greatest works.
My 1994 publication selection for book club.
Brave, bold, highly unsettling and occasionally outrageous, this unwieldy fable charts a double territory of place, vocabulary and possibility through a vaudevillian cast of characters and events. Yet in spite of its brilliance, this maverick tour-de-force never quite achieves the magic of Carey’s greatest works.
My 1994 publication selection for book club.
Read
April 27, 2020When he was born, the attending doctors wanted to let Tristan Smith die, such were his deformities. And he would never outgrow them. It takes awhile for the reader to understand the specifics, but in this unusual novel of Peter Carey we finally learn. Tristan has no lips. And he has weird white eyes. His legs were like pipe-cleaners, and bent pipe-cleaners at that. He ambulated on his ankles, abrading a body easily abraded. He vomited often. Some of this is told in the first-person:
My face never coloured evenly. When I was upset my nose steamed. I dribbled, and my head jerked and rolled.
He would grow to be three-foot, six inches. And his voice . . . It's a screech, a howl. It's rendered, stylistically, like this: 'I . . . know . . . I'm . . . ugly.' But only a few can make out what he's said.
People are so revolted by Tristan that he wears a mask, or a stitched-up mouse suit.
Yet Tristan aches. The sexual urges will come, and with them doubt and pain. He aches too, against all counsel, to be an actor, both a stage actor and a circus tumbler. I did not know what roles I would play, but I imagined them as great ones, not the parts written for Fools or Jugglers, but those for Kings to whose own loves and tragedies, misfortunes, weaknesses of spirit, I would lend my own peculiarly expressive form. I could be their spirit, manifest, their pain made three dimensional, their tragedy got up to walk around.
And if the title character isn't weird enough . . .
The setting is, first, in the imagined country of Efica, and second, in the dominant country of Voorstand. There's a lot going on there, hints of Australia and New Zealand, of Britain and France, of the United States and the Third World, generally. There's an invented patois and mythology. That Efica includes a group of small islands called The Madeleines might make you consider another largely bedridden character. And, of course, the title of the book and the unusual name and initials of the title character might make you think of another TS.
This book asks a lot of the reader and I suspect it would have a limited audience. I'm not entirely sure yet that I am in that audience. But I know a lot of books I read, even this year, are already turning to sepia, plots and characters fading away. This one . . . this one I will never forget.
My face never coloured evenly. When I was upset my nose steamed. I dribbled, and my head jerked and rolled.
He would grow to be three-foot, six inches. And his voice . . . It's a screech, a howl. It's rendered, stylistically, like this: 'I . . . know . . . I'm . . . ugly.' But only a few can make out what he's said.
People are so revolted by Tristan that he wears a mask, or a stitched-up mouse suit.
Yet Tristan aches. The sexual urges will come, and with them doubt and pain. He aches too, against all counsel, to be an actor, both a stage actor and a circus tumbler. I did not know what roles I would play, but I imagined them as great ones, not the parts written for Fools or Jugglers, but those for Kings to whose own loves and tragedies, misfortunes, weaknesses of spirit, I would lend my own peculiarly expressive form. I could be their spirit, manifest, their pain made three dimensional, their tragedy got up to walk around.
And if the title character isn't weird enough . . .
The setting is, first, in the imagined country of Efica, and second, in the dominant country of Voorstand. There's a lot going on there, hints of Australia and New Zealand, of Britain and France, of the United States and the Third World, generally. There's an invented patois and mythology. That Efica includes a group of small islands called The Madeleines might make you consider another largely bedridden character. And, of course, the title of the book and the unusual name and initials of the title character might make you think of another TS.
This book asks a lot of the reader and I suspect it would have a limited audience. I'm not entirely sure yet that I am in that audience. But I know a lot of books I read, even this year, are already turning to sepia, plots and characters fading away. This one . . . this one I will never forget.
May 22, 2011
Reading Peter Carey is always a gamble. The bower-bird nature of his source material, where his current obsessions - often an aspect of the creative life - is unpicked to the point of immersion, sometimes comes off and sometimes doesn't. His books are quilts - glass and gambling, painting and forgery, ern malley and the botany of Malaysia. Does that last one jar a little?
You bet it did. My Life as a Fake was the worst Carey book I've suffered, a hopeless melange of Frankenstein, Carey's nostalgia for a good nonya curry, and the fascinating tale of the Malley hoax. With child stealing and post-colonial jungle riffing on the side. It just did not work as a whole book. TOO MUCH. Even Carey can fail to convince us with his incredible ear for jerked dialogue, gumbo politics and grotesque mise en scene.
But this one - Tristan Smith is a pearler. I'd heard absolutely naught about it, and now I know why. It's tough, in the same way Sterne's book, one of its obvious echoes, is tough. 150 page diversions on the narrator's birth aren't for everybody. As usual, Carey bites off way too much and chews like crazy.
Obsessions, catalogued within:
The theatre, the real experience of acting on stage, and receiving that action - right up close, in the footlights. Raw theatre, Pram Factory Theatre. Sometimes terrible, because it's risky, alchemical, apt to blow up.
Congenital deformity. How would it work if the protagonist was saddled with serious handicaps to his speech, movement, digestion? Unable to walk? Unable to be looked at?
Politics. Imagine Australia and the US and the deep contradictions of their relationship. BUT - they are not Australia and the US - in this world Australia was a colony of France, the US a colony of Holland. OK.
Linguistics. The above shift means that the cultural referents, the slang, the religion, everything - has evolved differently. And you'd better keep up 'cause he ain't explaining it.
Circus. The history of danger and mimetics, Hermes-trickery and human sacrifice - it's Cirque de Soleil without nets, with the possibility of death. Circus as actual religion, as addiction.
It's mad and magnificent. I read it in total silence and concentration away from everything, and was convinced and transported to those places without question. It's hard work. I bet it wasn't popular. But read it; The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith is shit hot.
You bet it did. My Life as a Fake was the worst Carey book I've suffered, a hopeless melange of Frankenstein, Carey's nostalgia for a good nonya curry, and the fascinating tale of the Malley hoax. With child stealing and post-colonial jungle riffing on the side. It just did not work as a whole book. TOO MUCH. Even Carey can fail to convince us with his incredible ear for jerked dialogue, gumbo politics and grotesque mise en scene.
But this one - Tristan Smith is a pearler. I'd heard absolutely naught about it, and now I know why. It's tough, in the same way Sterne's book, one of its obvious echoes, is tough. 150 page diversions on the narrator's birth aren't for everybody. As usual, Carey bites off way too much and chews like crazy.
Obsessions, catalogued within:
The theatre, the real experience of acting on stage, and receiving that action - right up close, in the footlights. Raw theatre, Pram Factory Theatre. Sometimes terrible, because it's risky, alchemical, apt to blow up.
Congenital deformity. How would it work if the protagonist was saddled with serious handicaps to his speech, movement, digestion? Unable to walk? Unable to be looked at?
Politics. Imagine Australia and the US and the deep contradictions of their relationship. BUT - they are not Australia and the US - in this world Australia was a colony of France, the US a colony of Holland. OK.
Linguistics. The above shift means that the cultural referents, the slang, the religion, everything - has evolved differently. And you'd better keep up 'cause he ain't explaining it.
Circus. The history of danger and mimetics, Hermes-trickery and human sacrifice - it's Cirque de Soleil without nets, with the possibility of death. Circus as actual religion, as addiction.
It's mad and magnificent. I read it in total silence and concentration away from everything, and was convinced and transported to those places without question. It's hard work. I bet it wasn't popular. But read it; The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith is shit hot.
Read
January 26, 2021I don't often give up on books I choose to read (unless they're riddled with grammar or typographical errors). I feel that the author should have the chance to tell his or her full story. However, after wading through The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith for six weeks, having reached roughly the two thirds point, I decided to throw in the towel.
It's not a bad book. In fact it's wildly creative, imagining not one but two antagonistic but interlinked societies, with their own histories, cultures, politics, mythologies, criminals and intelligence agents. Somehow, though, I could not get excited enough about Efica and Voorstand to sustain the energy needed to consume this dense novel - dense in both external detail and emotion. I got tired of the footnotes about events that I obviously knew nothing about (since they were fictional) but which the narrative hinted I should recognize. I also rather lost patience with the main character, whose main attribute other than intelligence seems to be a disasterous stubbornness.
I've read in other reviews that the relationship between Efica and Voorstand was supposed to be a stand-in for the uneasy bonds between Australia and the U.S. Since I'm not Australian, I may not be qualified to comment, but I saw few similarities.
Anyway, if you're drawn to this book, don't be put off by my not finishing it. Peter Carey's a brilliant writer. Maybe this book was too brilliant for me.
It's not a bad book. In fact it's wildly creative, imagining not one but two antagonistic but interlinked societies, with their own histories, cultures, politics, mythologies, criminals and intelligence agents. Somehow, though, I could not get excited enough about Efica and Voorstand to sustain the energy needed to consume this dense novel - dense in both external detail and emotion. I got tired of the footnotes about events that I obviously knew nothing about (since they were fictional) but which the narrative hinted I should recognize. I also rather lost patience with the main character, whose main attribute other than intelligence seems to be a disasterous stubbornness.
I've read in other reviews that the relationship between Efica and Voorstand was supposed to be a stand-in for the uneasy bonds between Australia and the U.S. Since I'm not Australian, I may not be qualified to comment, but I saw few similarities.
Anyway, if you're drawn to this book, don't be put off by my not finishing it. Peter Carey's a brilliant writer. Maybe this book was too brilliant for me.
January 5, 2013
I had been meaning to read something by Peter Carey when I found this at the Friends of the Library book sale and was intrigued because the premise reminded me of Russell Hoban's Riddley Walker, Like Hoban's post-apocalyptic novel this one has an invented language, though it doesn't seem as pervasive as the argot of Riddley Walker and there is the use of puppets and miracle type entertainments as a central part of the cultures' religions. The book set on my bedside shelf for several years before I finally made a move to read it. I wish I hadn't waited so long; it is wonderfully entertaining. First off, having now read the book, the Riddley Walker parallel is not as strong as it seemed it might be, though I believe fans of Hoban's book will be equally intrigued by Carey's inventive narrative and ability to create characters who are simultaneously appalling and appealing. Take the main character, Tristan Smith, a severely disfigured child. Tristan besides being physically repulsive, to the extent that he is often referred to as a mutant, also has personal characteristics which can be unnerving. However, his tenacity, sense of humor and intelligence make him appealing. The narrative follows Tristan from childhood to young adulthood as he navigates the world as a seriously handicapped, reviled target of public stares and hatefulness. He is raised by a set of adults: his politically active mother who runs an avantgarde theatre company; Tristan's actor-Sirkus star father; his mother's wealthy lover and an old criminal who watches over all of them. As the story progresses an odd assortment of character drift into their lives setting the already unsteady balance perilously awry.
While the characters are fascintaing, the interplay between the two countries which serve as the setting is also intriguing. Tristan grows up in the tropical Efica, a very small island country and a former colonial possession of the the French and English. The shadowing Voortstad, also a post colonial nation, but one that has become a superpower while Efica languished, dominates the politics and cultural life of Tristan's country despite the two being separated by thousands of miles. Carey creates for each unique cultural identities right down their odd twists on Christianity, political, design and cultural histories and, as mentioned earlier, their own versions of English. Although the countries are entirely created, they have the ring of truth to them. While created, it would be nearly impossible to read the novel without seeing America as at least partially an inspiration for Voorstad, though there are certainly South African elements to the country as well.
Cultural imperialism, superpower policing of smaller countries, national and personal identity, family, all of these are addressed in Carey's richly invented, thought provoking novel.
While the characters are fascintaing, the interplay between the two countries which serve as the setting is also intriguing. Tristan grows up in the tropical Efica, a very small island country and a former colonial possession of the the French and English. The shadowing Voortstad, also a post colonial nation, but one that has become a superpower while Efica languished, dominates the politics and cultural life of Tristan's country despite the two being separated by thousands of miles. Carey creates for each unique cultural identities right down their odd twists on Christianity, political, design and cultural histories and, as mentioned earlier, their own versions of English. Although the countries are entirely created, they have the ring of truth to them. While created, it would be nearly impossible to read the novel without seeing America as at least partially an inspiration for Voorstad, though there are certainly South African elements to the country as well.
Cultural imperialism, superpower policing of smaller countries, national and personal identity, family, all of these are addressed in Carey's richly invented, thought provoking novel.
August 10, 2011
Whilst the world-building that went into it was interesting and Carey's technical ability is always at the very least serviceable throughout the novel, I just wasn't really engaged much in any other capacity and was left with nothing more than a sour-taste in my mouth and a profound sense of apathy for the entire endeavour. It just wasn't my cup of tea, at all.
February 27, 2019
This was...different.
February 8, 2009
Funny, sad, thrilling and thought-provoking. To thoroughly comprehend this book, it probably helps to be Australian: although set in mythical nations Efica and Voorstand, it quite brilliantly explores the love-hate relationship which Australians have with American culture. However, the book never takes itself too seriously, and moves easily between comedy, tragedy and adventure. A book not to be taken on holiday, because you won't be able to put it down.
October 31, 2025
This is the 3rd Peter Carey novel I’ve read *. Like the others, it has a variety of quirky aspects alloyed with the routine movements of everyday life. The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith is a 2-book story and by far the quirkiest. However, it’s the least appealing. This is a shame, as the underpinnings seemed very promising, but the execution poor, especially in Book II.
There’s something, not exactly arrogant, but ‘affected’ in Carey’s writing of this novel. The attempt to create 2 culturally connected but nevertheless clashing worlds in among the familiar history of colonial dominance of countries such as England and France falls flat if only because of the determination to give them credibility through the use of footnotes, rather like an encyclopaedia, and personalised addenda, rather like an historian stepping outside the facts to give a personal opinion.
Almost from the start, I found this approach incredibly annoying (and unnecessary); even more so because the narrator is never, over the course of story, shown to be (or even hinted at being) someone who would eventually become sufficiently famous that he would somehow write up the grand opera of his life and times from an historical perspective. These footnotes/addenda dropped off over the course of the novel, which only seemed to show that the author himself got bored with maintaining the pretext.
Early on, the novel also switches between Tristan’s first-person view, and a third-person view of Tristan. This was confusing, not because the switches in view weren’t obvious enough each time, but because their value to the crafting of the story seemed valueless. These switches, too, disappeared, and the loss was as welcome as the reduction in footnotes.
Unfortunately, the 3rd thing to wither away was the wide cast of (very) quirky characters. These characters – and they are characters, in terms of personality, in the best sense of the word – helped drive the storyline. They were never replaced by anything half so good.
Despite this, Book I held itself together pretty well, though not brilliantly.
Book II is where the wheels fell off. In Book II, Tristan and 2 others did ‘it’ – I’m not going to say what ‘it’ is because I don’t want to give away the plot but why on Earth they did ‘it’ in the way they did ‘it’ is simply unfathomable. Normally a patient person, I started to become impatient of the hope that this inexplicable approach would be resolved in some cunning way. Impatience turned eventually to exasperation.
If this had been the only issue then, again, Book II might just have held its ground but, unfortunately, the novel branched out in a variety of ‘thrown-in’ ways. And while Carey didn’t exactly lose sight of how all these moving parts were to be controlled, he certainly, in my view, lost credibility for developing a cohesive and believable story.
In the end, I was almost hoping for one more foolish development to feed, rather than assuage, my exasperation.
Carey, every now and then, is canvassed as a potential for the Nobel Prize. I don’t see it but you never know – he wouldn’t be the first largely unjustifiable winner.
* Each, also, has question marks over the quality of the writing, for different reasons.
The Tax Inspector is an average length novel and enjoyable, though the ending left quite a bit to be desired.
Oscar and Lucinda was certainly readable but far too long for what it had to say.
And this one – The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith – well, see above.
There’s something, not exactly arrogant, but ‘affected’ in Carey’s writing of this novel. The attempt to create 2 culturally connected but nevertheless clashing worlds in among the familiar history of colonial dominance of countries such as England and France falls flat if only because of the determination to give them credibility through the use of footnotes, rather like an encyclopaedia, and personalised addenda, rather like an historian stepping outside the facts to give a personal opinion.
Almost from the start, I found this approach incredibly annoying (and unnecessary); even more so because the narrator is never, over the course of story, shown to be (or even hinted at being) someone who would eventually become sufficiently famous that he would somehow write up the grand opera of his life and times from an historical perspective. These footnotes/addenda dropped off over the course of the novel, which only seemed to show that the author himself got bored with maintaining the pretext.
Early on, the novel also switches between Tristan’s first-person view, and a third-person view of Tristan. This was confusing, not because the switches in view weren’t obvious enough each time, but because their value to the crafting of the story seemed valueless. These switches, too, disappeared, and the loss was as welcome as the reduction in footnotes.
Unfortunately, the 3rd thing to wither away was the wide cast of (very) quirky characters. These characters – and they are characters, in terms of personality, in the best sense of the word – helped drive the storyline. They were never replaced by anything half so good.
Despite this, Book I held itself together pretty well, though not brilliantly.
Book II is where the wheels fell off. In Book II, Tristan and 2 others did ‘it’ – I’m not going to say what ‘it’ is because I don’t want to give away the plot but why on Earth they did ‘it’ in the way they did ‘it’ is simply unfathomable. Normally a patient person, I started to become impatient of the hope that this inexplicable approach would be resolved in some cunning way. Impatience turned eventually to exasperation.
If this had been the only issue then, again, Book II might just have held its ground but, unfortunately, the novel branched out in a variety of ‘thrown-in’ ways. And while Carey didn’t exactly lose sight of how all these moving parts were to be controlled, he certainly, in my view, lost credibility for developing a cohesive and believable story.
In the end, I was almost hoping for one more foolish development to feed, rather than assuage, my exasperation.
Carey, every now and then, is canvassed as a potential for the Nobel Prize. I don’t see it but you never know – he wouldn’t be the first largely unjustifiable winner.
* Each, also, has question marks over the quality of the writing, for different reasons.
The Tax Inspector is an average length novel and enjoyable, though the ending left quite a bit to be desired.
Oscar and Lucinda was certainly readable but far too long for what it had to say.
And this one – The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith – well, see above.
November 10, 2022
This was difficult to rate. There are issues that could be taken with it, but ultimately it is brilliant. It is long, dense but superbly creative. Set in a fictional country but with all the elements of a colony struggling under the dominance of an imperial power parallels are obvious. The main preoccupation is the circus and circus skills. The main character is the malformed offspring of a circus owner and one of three possible fathers, all of whom retain some sort of parental role through his life. He is so deformed that doctors planned not to let him live beyond his birth. Yet he lives to develop aspirations to become a great actor. The story follows his adventures through politics, espionage, acting, love and sexual frustration to the heights of wealth and power in the Voorstand empire.
The writing is sharp, the characters well drawn and the plot lines gripping.
A great read.
The writing is sharp, the characters well drawn and the plot lines gripping.
A great read.
March 24, 2021
The political and cultural dynamics of the relationship between Voorstand and Efica recall the relationship between the United States and third-world or peripheral countries. Some elements of Voorstand's history and culture are also reminiscent of the Boers.
Almost the entire novel takes place within the worlds of the theatre or of the circus. Tristan's short stature and deformities place him in an equivocal position as both a serious actor (and devotee of Stanislavski) and as a circus "freak."
Tristan Smith's initials and first name suggest the hero of Laurence Sterne's Tristram Shandy.
A group of islands in the southern portion of Efica bear the name of "the Madeleines," apparently because their shape resembles the French cakes of that name.
Almost the entire novel takes place within the worlds of the theatre or of the circus. Tristan's short stature and deformities place him in an equivocal position as both a serious actor (and devotee of Stanislavski) and as a circus "freak."
Tristan Smith's initials and first name suggest the hero of Laurence Sterne's Tristram Shandy.
A group of islands in the southern portion of Efica bear the name of "the Madeleines," apparently because their shape resembles the French cakes of that name.
September 10, 2022
Man, I liked this one! Really cool character-driven storyline set in an unstable colony of the fictional Dutch, English & French. Set in a turbulent developing country, the characters (all performers of theatre or sirkus) are just as uneasy. It was reminiscent of A Prayer For Owen Meany (minus the capslock but full of ellipses), but I didn't have to stop and start reading it 5 separate times (sorry, Irving).
April 12, 2008
It is an odd book. I really like Peter Carey, but I'm not quite sure what he was trying to get at in this story. Still, it is well written, with magical elements and a picture of a weird world, and it is written as a quest which I always like. It somehow seems like it owes something to the Tin Drum by Gunter Grass, but maybe because they both feature deformed midgets.
July 7, 2011
This book is SO GOOD. The world Carey creates, the two countries, Efica and Voorstand, the lingo, the cultures. The themes of love, ambition, identity. The characters. The scale of time. I see I am resorting to a list of nouns, but these are all the things I that were so wonderfully notable about this book. Peter Carey ftw.
May 10, 2007
A strange and twisted novel set in a non-existent place yet imbued with a ring of familiarity despite its fantastical set-up and singularly mal-formed title character. We never exactly what is wrong with him, but the story doesn't suffer, it's a very interesting work.
April 4, 2011
I stopped reading it after the first half because I found it a bit tedious and not nearly as good as his other books. I pretty much never stop reading a book but I found myself just wanting to read something else instead and life's too short.
December 6, 2011
Strange book that pretty much describes all of Carey's work. This one though didn't capture my imagination like the others had.
April 2, 2008
One of the most intriguing and mystifying books I have ever read. Outstanding, imaginative and compelling.
July 28, 2014
Odd book. This was suggested to me by someone because of another book that I loved and I found this did not match up for me.
July 9, 2008
AWESOME! Love this book
August 21, 2015
If the varied works of Peter Carey have a unifying thread, it’s his fascination with what it means to be Australian, and Australia’s relationship with the rest of the world. Illywhacker, his second novel, was the first to thoroughly explore this theme, covering three generations of an Australian family across the 20th century, their country in thrall first to the British and later to the Americans. The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith, written a few years after Carey moved permanently to New York, explores this relationship through the use of two invented countries: Efica, a French-settled collection of subtropical islands with a population of three million, and Voorstand, an enormous, continent-sized superpower originally settled by the Dutch.
Tristan Smith is born in Chemin Rouge, the capital of Efica, to Felicity Smith, the founder and operator of a left-wing theatre and acting troupe. His father may be any one of her three lovers: Vincent, a business magnate, Wally, the theatre’s producer, and Bill, one of the young actors. Unfortunately for him, Tristan is born a deformed cripple with mangled legs and not enough skin across his face, and the novel follows his difficult life in Efica and later Voorstand.
Tristan is the novel’s narrator (an oddly omniscient one, not unlike Illywhacker and Oscar and Lucinda) and he addresses his story to a hypothetical reader in Voorstand, admitting that this is “the periphery shouting at the centre.” Later, when he arrives in Voorstand as an adult and is dismayed by how the dirty and decrepit cities do not match up to his expectations, he explains to the reader why this upsets him: “Madam, Meneer, you are part of our hearts in a way you could not dream.” The novel is littered with Tristan’s patient explanations to the Voorstand reader about just how important Voorstand is to the rest of the world, in subtle ways they may not grasp.
This is not unique to Australia, of course. People in countries all over the world, these days, grow up on a diet of American culture. You feel you know the place well before you ever go there, and you know much, much more about America than Americans know about wherever you’re from. (This is also true of Australia looking up to the United Kingdom, and perhaps New Zealand looking up to Australia.) It’s not a negative thing, it’s just very interesting, and odd in the sense that Americans themselves can never experience it, because no country’s culture is more pervasive than their own.
Passive cultural domination is one thing; aggressive political and military domination is quite another. The caves in Efica’s southern islands are threaded with Voorstandish naval navigation cable; their northern islands contain toxic waste dumps from Voorstand’s nuclear plants; and when Tristan’s mother runs for office and looks set to claim a victory for her left-wing party, the Voorstandish intelligence agencies become increasingly, horrifyingly hostile. This segment of the book is based in part on Peter Carey’s long-standing belief (which he explores more thoroughly in his 2014 novel Amnesia) that the CIA played in active role in the dismissal of Australia’s left-wing Prime Minister Gough Whitlam in 1975. This belief is of dubious merit, in my opinion, but no matter; one does not need to look far to find the long arm of American interests meddling in the governments of minor countries all over the globe, all over history. The useful thing about using allegorical countries is that they can stand in for many real countries, and indeed Carey has spoken about how The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith was received in different countries:
INTERVIEWER: As you write in Tristan Smith, again addressing Voorstand, “You stand with your hand over your heart when the Great Song is played. You daily watch new images of your armies in the vids and the zines.”
CAREY: When I read that line to a Canadian audience, I can feel them ‘get’ the line. I mean, they understand about the big country and the little country and they know which is which. Yet I have sometimes been surprised to discover American readers who never saw any connection between Voorstand and the United States. I suppose that one of the things about false consciousness is not having self-perception.
Carey spends a lot of time developing this alternate little world dominated by Voorstand – a world in which he can naturally never mention America or Australia, nor any part of the New World at all, but in which Europe and Africa and Asia still exist. The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith is full of footnotes, asides, maps, and references to fictional books and documentaries, all in an attempt to build a sense of verisimilitude for these made-up nations; for Efica with its history of dyeing and convict settlements, for Voorstand with its unsettling Disney-esque religion and the great entertainment of the Sirkus. Carey also invents hundreds of slang words derived from French and Dutch, used in dialogue throughout and filling a glossary appendix. Whether this worldbuilding succeeds or not is largely a matter of opinion. Personally I thought he scraped through.
The novel is then, unfortunately, let down by its own plot. It creaks along well enough for the first half, carried by the reader’s expectation that this will all build to something. The second half becomes something of a shaggy dog story – and not in a good way like Illywhacker. Carey lost my attention about two thirds of the way through and never regained it. His prose here also seems to lack something. I couldn’t quite put my finger on what. Perhaps it’s so caught up in servicing the fictional world that it doesn’t strike the level of wry clarity I’ve come to expect from him. It feels a lot more like one of his bizarre short stories than one of his great novels.
The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith is undeniably an ambitious book. It’s big, it’s bold, it makes an audacious and unapologetic demand for your suspension of disbelief. I can understand why Carey wrote it and why some people would love it. But for me, although it strikes some interesting notes (mostly because I’m Australian) it’s ultimately a failure. Carey is one of my favourite writers, but I found this to be his least interesting novel since Bliss.
His next two are Jack Maggs and True History of The Kelly Gang, both of which I’ve already read, so next up is either his non-fiction book 30 Days In Sydney: A Wildly Distorted Account or his 2003 novel My Life As A Fake.
Tristan Smith is born in Chemin Rouge, the capital of Efica, to Felicity Smith, the founder and operator of a left-wing theatre and acting troupe. His father may be any one of her three lovers: Vincent, a business magnate, Wally, the theatre’s producer, and Bill, one of the young actors. Unfortunately for him, Tristan is born a deformed cripple with mangled legs and not enough skin across his face, and the novel follows his difficult life in Efica and later Voorstand.
Tristan is the novel’s narrator (an oddly omniscient one, not unlike Illywhacker and Oscar and Lucinda) and he addresses his story to a hypothetical reader in Voorstand, admitting that this is “the periphery shouting at the centre.” Later, when he arrives in Voorstand as an adult and is dismayed by how the dirty and decrepit cities do not match up to his expectations, he explains to the reader why this upsets him: “Madam, Meneer, you are part of our hearts in a way you could not dream.” The novel is littered with Tristan’s patient explanations to the Voorstand reader about just how important Voorstand is to the rest of the world, in subtle ways they may not grasp.
This is not unique to Australia, of course. People in countries all over the world, these days, grow up on a diet of American culture. You feel you know the place well before you ever go there, and you know much, much more about America than Americans know about wherever you’re from. (This is also true of Australia looking up to the United Kingdom, and perhaps New Zealand looking up to Australia.) It’s not a negative thing, it’s just very interesting, and odd in the sense that Americans themselves can never experience it, because no country’s culture is more pervasive than their own.
Passive cultural domination is one thing; aggressive political and military domination is quite another. The caves in Efica’s southern islands are threaded with Voorstandish naval navigation cable; their northern islands contain toxic waste dumps from Voorstand’s nuclear plants; and when Tristan’s mother runs for office and looks set to claim a victory for her left-wing party, the Voorstandish intelligence agencies become increasingly, horrifyingly hostile. This segment of the book is based in part on Peter Carey’s long-standing belief (which he explores more thoroughly in his 2014 novel Amnesia) that the CIA played in active role in the dismissal of Australia’s left-wing Prime Minister Gough Whitlam in 1975. This belief is of dubious merit, in my opinion, but no matter; one does not need to look far to find the long arm of American interests meddling in the governments of minor countries all over the globe, all over history. The useful thing about using allegorical countries is that they can stand in for many real countries, and indeed Carey has spoken about how The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith was received in different countries:
INTERVIEWER: As you write in Tristan Smith, again addressing Voorstand, “You stand with your hand over your heart when the Great Song is played. You daily watch new images of your armies in the vids and the zines.”
CAREY: When I read that line to a Canadian audience, I can feel them ‘get’ the line. I mean, they understand about the big country and the little country and they know which is which. Yet I have sometimes been surprised to discover American readers who never saw any connection between Voorstand and the United States. I suppose that one of the things about false consciousness is not having self-perception.
Carey spends a lot of time developing this alternate little world dominated by Voorstand – a world in which he can naturally never mention America or Australia, nor any part of the New World at all, but in which Europe and Africa and Asia still exist. The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith is full of footnotes, asides, maps, and references to fictional books and documentaries, all in an attempt to build a sense of verisimilitude for these made-up nations; for Efica with its history of dyeing and convict settlements, for Voorstand with its unsettling Disney-esque religion and the great entertainment of the Sirkus. Carey also invents hundreds of slang words derived from French and Dutch, used in dialogue throughout and filling a glossary appendix. Whether this worldbuilding succeeds or not is largely a matter of opinion. Personally I thought he scraped through.
The novel is then, unfortunately, let down by its own plot. It creaks along well enough for the first half, carried by the reader’s expectation that this will all build to something. The second half becomes something of a shaggy dog story – and not in a good way like Illywhacker. Carey lost my attention about two thirds of the way through and never regained it. His prose here also seems to lack something. I couldn’t quite put my finger on what. Perhaps it’s so caught up in servicing the fictional world that it doesn’t strike the level of wry clarity I’ve come to expect from him. It feels a lot more like one of his bizarre short stories than one of his great novels.
The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith is undeniably an ambitious book. It’s big, it’s bold, it makes an audacious and unapologetic demand for your suspension of disbelief. I can understand why Carey wrote it and why some people would love it. But for me, although it strikes some interesting notes (mostly because I’m Australian) it’s ultimately a failure. Carey is one of my favourite writers, but I found this to be his least interesting novel since Bliss.
His next two are Jack Maggs and True History of The Kelly Gang, both of which I’ve already read, so next up is either his non-fiction book 30 Days In Sydney: A Wildly Distorted Account or his 2003 novel My Life As A Fake.
August 19, 2019
Great artists are able to put colors together in ways that surprise and shock. There's a recklessness to their combinations and textures. Similarly, the greatest musicians don't just play the requisite pitch: the note splinters open, revealing harmonics and extra-harmonic sounds. And Peter Carey does this in his writing: each sentence reveals far more than just the next segment in sequential narration. As in his other books, there's no simple way to summarize. It's about differently damaged people struggling to make meaningful lives. It's an epic journey. It's anger at covert American interference in Australian politics. It's a mythology in an alternate universe which as in Disney is centered around the mouse, the duck, and the dog. The hideous becomes beautiful, and the beautiful becomes hideous. Many grand gestures.
September 21, 2024
Incredibly dense and full of metaphors and allegories of the relationship and reliance between Australia and the USA. For me, the drive but naivety of the changes that people saw, or later mythologised, Gough Whitlam being out to make. Scenarios of electoral interference (political assassination), toxic waste dumping, deep unpublished Defence capabilities, soldiers fighting someone else's war... all things that can still today make Australian media headlines in a heartbeat, believed, and managed so, to strike a nerve in the Australian psyche.
A mad experience really. Much of the Efica and Voorstand particulars are lost on me but, at the same time, it's gripping.
A mad experience really. Much of the Efica and Voorstand particulars are lost on me but, at the same time, it's gripping.
February 10, 2025
With a cast of misfits, this book takes us on a part life journey through the eyes of its greatest misfit, Tristan. It explores colonialism, power, initiative, survival and love but never quite makes any salient point about any of them. Carey's writing is wonderful and that is what keeps you reading. The story is less so. Despite wanting to read to the end, I was left a little disappointed. It was anticlimactic. If I could have given it 3.5 starts, I would have.
July 18, 2025
Funny, sad, thrilling and thought-provoking. To thoroughly comprehend this book, it probably helps to be Australian: although set in mythical nations Efica and Voorstand, it quite brilliantly explores the love-hate relationship which Australians have with American culture. However, the book never takes itself too seriously, and moves easily between comedy, tragedy and adventure. A book not to be taken on holiday, because you won't be able to put it down.
February 10, 2025
A tour de force of imaginative writing. Carey has created a fantastical, inventive story in extraordinary detail against which he develops ideas about Imperialism, national & cultural identity, myth & superstition, and the commercialization of the Arts. In the end, the story seems unresolved but along the way Carey dazzles us with the sheer genius of his language.
November 6, 2017
I am a Peter Carey fan, but this book is a disappointment. Seems Carey has taken an evening course in culture studies (or maybe he teaches one) and has written a study text. Plenty of grievance and victimhood here. Cultural hegemony abounds. A book to launch a thousand dreary essays.
October 9, 2018
While the concept is very interesting and the writing is intriguing, this book sometimes feels like it is trying too hard to create another world. The sexual nature of some of it is a little affronting.
June 2, 2019
This book makes for difficult reading. Rambling, at times hints of magical realism and at other times immerses itself in contemporary geopolitics and post colonial discourse. A strange, confusing book filled with odd side plots and confusing extra characters.
June 8, 2019
Found it sadly difficult to get interested in the novel or the characters, and eventually put the book down, un-finished. Not something I do often, and for this great writer in particular that was a letdown. His creation of fantasy worlds was lacking spark.
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