The Nightwatchman's Occurrence Book: And Other Comic Inventions (Vintage International)

Review ?V. S. Naipaul is the world?s writer, a master of language and perception.? ?_The New York Times Book Review_ ?As delightful as anything Naipaul has written.? ?_The New York Review of Books_ ?V. S. Naipaul has a substantial claim as a comic writer. . . . This humor, conducted throughout with the utmost stylistic quietude, is completely original.? ?Kingsley Amis, The Spectator -- Review Product Description V. S. Naipaul�s legendary command of broad comedy and acute social observation is on abundant display in these classic works of fiction�two novels and a collection of stories�that capture the rhythms of life in the Caribbean and England with impressive subtlety and humor. The Suffrage of Elvira is Naipaul�s hilarious take on an electoral campaign in the back country of Trinidad, where the candidates� tactics include blatant vote-buying and supernatural sabotage. The eponymous protagonist of Mr. Stone and the Knights Companion is an aging Englishman of ponderously regular habits whose life is thrown into upheaval by a sudden marriage and unanticipated professional advancement. And the stories in A Flag on the Island take us from a Chinese bakery in Trinidad�whose black proprietor faces bankruptcy until he takes a Chinese name�to a rooming house in London�where the genteel landlady plays a nasty Darwinian game with her budgerigars. Unfailingly stylish, filled with intelligence and feeling, here is the work of a writer who can do just about anything that can be done with language. _ _ From the Nobel Prize-winning author comes two novels and a collection of stories that capture the rhythms of life in the Caribbean and England with impressive subtlety and humor. “The world’s writer, a master of language and perception.” — The New York Times Book Review The Suffrage of Elvira is Naipaul’s hilarious take on an electoral campaign in the back country of Trinidad, where the candidates’ tactics include blatant vote-buying and supernatural sabotage. The eponymous protagonist of Mr. Stone and the Knights Companion is an aging Englishman of ponderously regular habits whose life is thrown into upheaval by a sudden marriage and unanticipated professional advancement. And the stories in A Flag on the Island take us from a Chinese bakery in Trinidad—whose black proprietor faces bankruptcy until he takes a Chinese name—to a rooming house in London—where the genteel landlady plays a nasty Darwinian game with her budgerigars. Unfailingly stylish, filled with intelligence and feeling, here is the work of a writer who can do just about anything that can be done with language. The three stories in this book, "The Suffrage of Elvira, A Flag on the Island" and "Mr. Stone and the Knight's Companion, " take readers from a Chinese bakery in Trinidad to a rooming house in London, all in Naipaul's bizarre international style