Barney's Version

Barney’s Version
By Mordecai Richler

First a confession: this is the first Mordecai Richler book I’ve ever read (unless you count Jacob Two-two Meets the Hooded Fang, which I don’t). I know – bad Canadian. I’m not sure how I managed to get through high school AND an Honours English degree without ever having the Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz show up on a syllabus, but somehow I did.

First impressions: I HATE the cover of this book. I actually find it repellent. I opened this book not really expecting that I’d like it, but I was very pleasantly surprised and read the entire thing in two sittings.

Barney’s Version is a mockobiography – fiction written in the style of an autobiography, complete with an “Afterword” written by the main character’s fictional son. I found myself grudgingly liking Barney, the main character, by the end of the book in spite of myself. He possessed few (if any!) redeeming qualities, yet the confessional nature of the book detailed his mistakes, weaknesses and regrets in a way that humanized him for me.

What I liked about this book was that Richler cleverly demonstrated that there is no such thing as “truth”, as life is always obscured and coloured by our memories and perceptions. I highly recommend this book and I will definitely make a point of picking up some of Richler’s other works the next time I’m at the library.