The Unexpurgated Code: A Complete Manual of Survival and Manners
by J. P. Donleavy
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With the world a harsh and cruel place and an enemy out to get you if he can, courtesy will not make you rich overnight but by degrees it makes others feel good and this in turn will make you feel even etter ... With more and more folk from the wrong side of the tracks, it is important to make more room at the bottom. 'The Unexpurgated Code' takes plain folk through the useful rules of social climbing.Tags
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A subversive guide for the social climber – in the 1970s, or earlier. It’s like a character study of the “slobbering ass kisser, smirking interrogator, smug skeptic, bumptious begrudger and other malapert odious,” types that fill Donleavy’s novels.
Donleavy offers advice on accent improvement, decorating tips (“above all, avoid looking as if all you’ve got is money. The colour that makes you do this is purple”), and changing your name (“The world’s richest families often have the names best suited to you.”)
If you think death is an equalizer – think again. In Donleavy’s world, being “to the manor born” extends into the afterlife.
The book is almost nothing but humor. Artists are described as “folk manfully show more maintaining that money is not everything.” The insane have “minds chockablock with conclusions” and “can be recognized by the immediate interest they are willing to take in you.” show less
Donleavy offers advice on accent improvement, decorating tips (“above all, avoid looking as if all you’ve got is money. The colour that makes you do this is purple”), and changing your name (“The world’s richest families often have the names best suited to you.”)
If you think death is an equalizer – think again. In Donleavy’s world, being “to the manor born” extends into the afterlife.
The book is almost nothing but humor. Artists are described as “folk manfully show more maintaining that money is not everything.” The insane have “minds chockablock with conclusions” and “can be recognized by the immediate interest they are willing to take in you.” show less
For consumption in very small doses over a very long time, this can be occasionally amusing. (That it is also completely politically incorrect and out of keeping with modern times--or maybe any period of history--makes it difficult to swallow in larger pieces.) But no other book of manners will advise you on how to act at your own execution, so if you find yourself in such a situation, look no further.
Not something to sit down and read in one sitting, but interesting to glance through now and then. Just be warned that it's rather irreverant!
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31+ Works 5,573 Members
J. P. Donleavy was born James Patrick Donleavy Jr. in Brooklyn, New York on April 23, 1926. After serving in the Navy during World War II, he studied microbiology at Trinity College in Dublin. His first novel, The Ginger Man, was published in 1955. His other novels included A Singular Man, The Beastly Beatitudes of Balthazar B., The Onion Eaters, show more A Fairy Tale of New York, The Lady Who Liked Clean Rest Rooms, Wrong Information Is Being Given Out at Princeton, and The Destinies of Darcy Dancer, Gentleman. He also wrote nonfiction books including The Unexpurgated Code: A Complete Manual of Survival and Manners and plays including The Beastly Beatitudes. He was an accomplished painter and had exhibitions on both sides of the Atlantic, including a show at the National Arts Club in Manhattan in 2007. He died from a stroke on September 11, 2017 at the age of 91. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
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- Dutch, English
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