Porterhouse Blue by Tom Sharpe

Porterhouse Blue by Tom Sharpe

The basis of a PBS miniseries, Porterhouse Blue confirms that Tom Sharpe is an excellent writer and absolutely hilarious. His characterizations are deft, his plots are brilliant, and his prose style is smooth and winning (P.J. O'Rourke).

To Porterhouse College-bastion of a formidable crew team, lavish dining hall and wine cellar, and laughable academic standards-comes a crusading new Master. Porterhouse alumni believe in manly sports, the royal family, and brandy in the library with a fervor they bring to few intellectual positions. And the college upholds a long tradition of granting degrees to a certain number of muttonheaded young gentlemen of enviable pedigree and adequate family contribution to the school's treasury.

The new Master, afire with liberal zeal, upsets everyone's digestion with a speech outlining plans to do things that simply aren't done: the admission of women, a cafeteria to replace the revered service of the kitchens, and contraceptive dispensers in every bathroom. The shock of the new and modern rattles even the college retainers. The head porter, Skullion, perhaps the staunchest supporter of the old way, rallies some powerful graduates to the cause, including the illustrious Canon Bowel and the madly wealthy-and plain mad-Sir Cathcart D'Eath. Their counterrevolutionary efforts result, among other peculiar events, in the most bizarre disaster seen at Cambridge in five hundred years, and in an escalation of threats, bluffs, and maneuvers to shame the shadiest of politicians. And the production of an investigative documentary on the strange doings at Porterhouse precipitates scandal of the highest order and an utterly unforeseeable conclusion.

TOM SHARPE was born in 1928 and educated at Lancing College and Pembroke College, Cambridge. He did his National Service in the Marines before going to South Africa in 1951, where he did social work before teaching in Natal. He had a photographic studio in Pietermaritzburg from 1957 until 1961. From 1963 to 1972 he was a lecturer in History at the Cambridge College of Arts and Technology. In 1986 he was awarded the XXXIII-me Grand Prix de l'Humour Noir Xavier Forneret. He divides his time between Cambridge and Spain.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9780871132796
ISBN 10	0871132796
Title	Porterhouse Blue
Author	Tom Sharpe
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Paperback
Publisher	Grove Press / Atlantic Monthly Press
Year published	1994-01-18
Number of pages	224
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.
Note	Unavailable