Blott on the Landscape (1975)

Sir Giles a un siège au Parlement, un château et une femme - mais est-ce qu'on peut appeler ça une femme ? Lady Maud a un siège au cané, un château et un mari - mais est-ce qu'on peut appeler ça un mari ? Sir Giles est impuissant ; Lady Maud n'est pas près d'oublier leur nuit de noces. Elle n'a rien d'une bombe sexuelle mais elle veut un héritier. Comment susciter une brise de désir chez son masochiste de mari ? Chacun sa méthode. Il suffit, dans le cas présent, de faire passer une autoroute en plein cour du domaine séculaire. Les convoitises se déchaînent alors â un rythme effréné. Les juges rescapés d'empoisonnements alimentaires piétinent leur fierté d'hier ; les hauts fonctionnaires tombent très bas ; les masos tournent sado et inversement ; les jardiniers culbutent les ladies au beau milieu des plates-bandes. Jusqu'à l'embrasement final.

Blott on the Landscape by Tom Sharpe is very British: in its setting, and in the background ideas (wealthy, titled persons using clout to get what they want no matter what is best for their community). Sharpe's characters may remind readers of Monty Python (or Frye and Laurie!) but the chap who comes out on top is unique and it is worth reading to meet Blott. ( )

A rather cruel, farcical story set in a motorway building post-war era (published in 1975 but hard to tell if it was supposed to be exactly contemporary, or set a few years earlier). Maud Handyman wants children and no motorway, or a motorway going elsewhere, and possibly a divorce if that could be managed. Giles Handyman wants to keep his parliamentary seat, keep his wife because he'd have to pay up some money to divorce Maud, but get some money through a motorway compensation scheme...if he could just get the route right. He pulls some strings, and becomes hopeful when the ministry sends someone down - unfortunately they have a third route in mind..... After the first few pages I skim-read this to find out what happened; I didn't like the characters, and rapidly came to detest them. It was all supposed to be funny, but it headed straight into cruel, unpleasant, callous, and occasionally misogynistic, as far as I was concerned. I was given this book as a present - clearly the giver had a different sense of humour to mine - so I will be passing this one on. ( )

Very funny English farce, Blott a likeable romantic hero ( )

A comedy style story, set in England. A developer in a local community basically wants to demolish a town so he can build a bigarse road right through the middle. Needless to say, not all of the residents are happy about this, and the redoubtable Maude and her highly resourceful, as it turns out, decide to oppose it. Her gardener's name happens to be Blott.

http://freesf.strandedinoz.com/wordpress/2012/04/blott-on-the-landscape-tom-shar... ( )