Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Unavailable
    The Mighty Walzer
    Unavailable
    The Mighty Walzer
    Unavailable
    The Mighty Walzer
    Ebook103 pages1 hour

    The Mighty Walzer

    By Simon Bent and Howard Jacobson

    3.5/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    In my family we start out giants and end up pygmies, grandiosity runs in the blood.

    Oliver Walzer is shy, bookish, Jewish. He doesn’t know how to talk to girls. But he can chop, flick and spin a ping pong ball better than any teenager in Manchester. When Sheeny Waxman takes him under his wing on the Akiva Social Club Table Tennis team, Oliver channels his frustrated adolescent lust into the game he loves. That is until the heartbreaking Lorna Peachley and the prospect of a place at Cambridge take his eye off the ball.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherOberon Books
    Release dateJul 5, 2016
    ISBN9781783198351
    Unavailable
    The Mighty Walzer
    Author

    Simon Bent

    Simon Bent’s other plays include Bad Company, Goldhawk Road, Sugar Sugar (Bush Theatre, London); Shelter (Connections/National Theatre, London); Accomplices (Sheffield Crucible/National Theatre Studio); The Escapologist (Suspect Culture/Theatre Royal Plymouth); The Associate, A Prayer For Owen Meany (National Theatre, London); Under The Black Flag (Shakespeare’s Globe, London); Elling (Bush Theatre/Trafalgar Studios/ Broadway); Branded (Old Vic, London); Prick Up Your Ears (Comedy Theatre, London). Television/film include; The Yellow House, Sex the City and Me, This Charming Man and Christie Malry’s Own Double Entry for which he was nominated for a BA FTA.

    Related to The Mighty Walzer

    Related ebooks

    Performing Arts For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      It Girl OF the MONTH meet: AMELIA

      Dec 7, 2022

      AGE: 8 NICKNAME: Milly SIBLINGS: four younger sisters PETS: a cat called Olaf FAVE COLOUR: blue FAVE MOVIE: Boss Baby TV SHOW: The Dragon Riders FAVE ANIMAL: Bunny FUN FACTS: • I am flexible • I enjoy roller skating • I absolutely LOVE Slurpees • I l

      1 min read

    • Article

      Art Of Living Under A Shadow

      Sep 1, 2021

      Art Of Living Under A Shadow
      7 min read

    • Article

      At The Present Time

      Nov 1, 2022

      At The Present Time
      8 min read

    • Article

      LeTteR BocKS

      Jun 24, 2021

      SCIENTISTS say that in the future, all meals will be in the form of a pill. Let’s hope they are right, and they don’t develop them in the form of a suppository. I think that would make dining out a most unpleasant experience. Umberto Coaltit, Hull YO

      13 min read

    • Article

      Jarvis Cocker I REMEMBER…

      Aug 17, 2021

      Jarvis Cocker I REMEMBER…
      4 min read

    • Article

      Boy George I REMEMBER…

      Mar 16, 2021

      Boy George I REMEMBER…
      5 min read

    • Article

      Ian Anderson I REMEMBER…

      Jan 16, 2024

      Ian Anderson I REMEMBER…
      6 min read

    • Article

      Always A Champion

      Nov 27, 2023

      Always A Champion
      4 min read

    • Article

      Spider's Corner

      Jul 1, 2023

      Spider's Corner
      6 min read

    • Article

      Keep It rural!

      Oct 12, 2023

      Keep It rural!
      12 min read

    • Article

      Olly Goes To Hollywood

      Dec 15, 2021

      Olly Goes To Hollywood
      5 min read

    • Article

      Winter Car Hacks

      Jan 1, 2023

      Winter Car Hacks
      9 min read

    • Article

      Ghoulies and Ghosties

      Oct 1, 2022

      Ghoulies and Ghosties
      7 min read

    • Article

      The Last Frontier Homesteading in Alaska

      Oct 1, 2019

      The federal homestead program is over, but its spirit continues. To learn more, COBBLESTONE spoke with Otto Kilcher. Kilcher grew up in his parents’ log cabin on a 660-acre homestead outside of Homer, Alaska. He still lives on the homestead in anothe

      3 min read

    • Article

      IT GIRL OF the MONTH meet: ISABELLA

      Dec 3, 2023

      AGE: 9 NICKNAMES: Bella, Issy, Belle SIBLINGS: A younger brother, Lucas PETS: A dog, a cat, two guinea pigs, two birds, and seven chickens FAVE SINGERS: Billie Eilish and Taylor Swift FAVE COLOURS: Purple and blue FAVE TV SHOW: Wednesday FUN FACTS: •

      1 min read

    • Article

      David Harewood

      Mar 20, 2023

      David Harewood
      5 min read

    • Article

      Shaun Parker

      Mar 22, 2019

      Shaun Parker
      3 min read

    • Article

      Jazzie B

      Oct 16, 2023

      Jazzie B
      5 min read

    • Article

      On with The Show

      Dec 30, 2021

      On with The Show
      10 min read

    • Article

      Chairman Of The Hoard

      May 13, 2022

      Chairman Of The Hoard
      8 min read

    • Article

      Ashley Jensen Looks Back: ‘Somehow I Got To The Point Where I Was Sitting At An Awards Show With Glenn Close Winking At Me’

      Nov 4, 2023

      Born in 1969 in Dumfries and Galloway, Ashley Jensen is a stage and screen actor. Raised by her mother, Margaret, in Annan, she left home at 14 to study drama at the National Youth Theatre in London. After graduating from Queen Margaret University in

      5 min read

    • Article

      Q&A

      Jul 13, 2023

      Q&A
      3 min read

    • Article

      Ill communication

      Jan 14, 2019

      Ill communication
      13 min read

    • Article

      Jim Broadbent

      Mar 6, 2020

      Jim Broadbent
      2 min read

    • Article

      There Is Nothing Like My Dames

      Feb 8, 2023

      With the wonderful Dame Judi Dench, at the beginning of March, I am hosting a charity matinee at the London Palladium. It’s to mark my 75th birthday and, more importantly, to raise £ 75,000 for Great Ormond Street Hospital, where my youngest grandson

      3 min read

    Reviews for The Mighty Walzer

    3.5/5

    48 ratings16 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 4/5
      Having read the award winning, Finkler Question, I was looking forward to reading what is described as one of his early pieces of fiction.I was not in the least dissappointed. This is a very funny coming of age story about a boy obsessed with ping pong and sex. I can now see why Jacobson is often described as the English Philip Roth. The Mighty Walzer certainly is on par with Portnoy's Complaint.Well done!
    • 4/5
      Terrific ending to a funny and heartfelt story is somewhat marred by the pervasive use of Manchester slang and Yiddish throughout this book, usually without translation, although some key Yiddish terms are defined. It was fun at first to look up the Yiddish terms or to get meaning inferred by context, but then it just became tedious. (I did learn how to swear pretty well in Yiddish, and that's fun.)Overall, I just wish that Jacobson would have made his book more accessible to us Yanks and the rest of the English-speaking world -maybe with a glossary of terms? Anyway, parts of this books are hilarious, and the ending really touched me.
    • 2/5
      There's a lot to almost like in The Might Walzer and it's a novel I tried my darndest to like as well, but in the end I just couldn't make the leap. It's just too rambling, too random, and too full of subplots that never seem to go anywhere. The protagonist is bland. He's not likeable enough to root for, not dislikeable enough that you're waiting for his comeuppance. He's just there. The situations he's in just happen. There's really no narrative thrust throughout the novel, just a lot of "and this happenened, then this happened", etc.As for the ping-pong, maybe I've been trained by other sports novels like Shoeless Joe and Fever Pitch to expect that if a book contains a sport, then the sport is meaningful to the plot, that there will be parallels between the game and life, that there will be life lessons. Instead, there's just ping-pong as something to fill the pages. It could have been any sport. It just seems so superfluous.It's obvious that Jacobson has talent as a writer. The wordplay and pacing work quite well. But other than that, there is little to recommend this book.
    • 3/5
      This book has been a slow read for me. On the positive side, the writing is solid with a fair dose of humor. While I was not familiar with all of the Yiddish words, the context provided sufficient clues to deduce the meaning. The main problem with the story for me is that the narrative seems to lack any real tension because it just doesn't seem that there is any real goal the main character is trying to acheive. Things just happen to him.
    • 2/5
      I had a tough time getting into this book. It was well written, but just didn't capture my attention. Fans of Phillip Roth will presumably like this author's style. There is some satire, but it is a tad dry and is a bit dated. I discovered I'm just not that interested in reading pages about ping pong facts, plays, moves or strategies. I did put the book down, thinking that perhaps my mood would change on another day -- but after reading another hundred pages, I was still rather bored.
    • 4/5
      The energy of this book leaps off the pages from the very beginning: the prose is vibrant, creative and pulls the reader into the plot throughout. The characters are intriguing each in their own way: Joel's misplaced generosity, Oliver's indecisiveness, Sabine's passion: as they evolve through the book, they stay true to themselves - lessons will forge their character but they keep their inner core which make them both realistic and very human with their faults, blemishes and occasional triumph.The plot itself is probably what I see as the weakest element. I felt that it was a compendium of events with no obvious theme. Ping pong was the instigator and was weaved throughout the story, but served more as a prop than a real development. This was a slice of life, but not neatly packaged as I would expect in a book - I found my interest waning at times because I could see no obvious ties from the past to the future. I was relieved by the ending, however, which did just that: link the past and present, reunite key players in the book and elegantly finish off the story.The writing is definitely this book's strongest point, and I would recommend it just for that: it's not often such a frenetic pace can be maintained so well and so completely.
    • 2/5
      Reading the back of this novel, I thought it would be captivating and hilarious - and written somewhat in the vein of Mordecai Richler; however, after reading about 2/3rds of the novel, I must admit that I am a little disappointed by Roth's "The Mighty Walzer". It is obvious that Roth writes well. His sentences are well-constructed, and written, in some sections, almost in prosaic form; however, there is a detached quality to his writing that left me a little less than interested in the protagonist. While some sections of the novel had me guffawing over the hijinks that characters got into, it seemed that most of the plot was cluttered with unnecessary imagery and detail (almost Dickens-esque). There was nothing about this book that made me want to finish reading it.I really wanted to enjoy this book, but I just couldn't.
    • 2/5
      I received a copy of this book via librarything's early reviewer program. It was honestly a little too dense for my taste. Though Jacobson is definitely an amazing writer, I could not immerse myself in the story. It was almost too descriptive in such a way that I couldn't connect.
    • 3/5
      Descriptions of this book fall short. Jacobson is by all means a wonderful writer, and yet this book was so easy not to like. All the Yiddish made it hard to connect, some of it really needs some explaining, some you can read between the lines. The story picks up when describing ping pong, and then drops again when describing his aunts, and how he would cut their faces from pictures and add them to his soft porn books, and pull his wank to their faces. I finished the book, and it took everything I had to not just put it down. Very dry and redundant. I may try one of his other books, but this one went nowhere for me.
    • 4/5
      The Mighty Walzer is a book about love, sex, and ping pong in Manchester; written with Jacobson's witty wordplay, wry humour, and abundant energy. An excellent, funny, engaging book; I would recommend this to fans of early Philip Roth, some of John Irving, Peter Carey, or Gary Shteyngart. Well worth a read especially if you liked any of his other work. I would also recommend Kalooki Nights, and of course Booker-winning The Finkler Question (which, despite all the hullabaloo is not really a comic novel at all, Jacobson just can't help being funny). You should also see him read if you ever get the chance, as brilliant and funny in person as he is on the page.
    • 4/5
      A highly entertaining Bildungsroman (Anglo-Jewish) which, as vegetrendian notes, celebrates (and often scorns) ping pong, sex and love, primarily in 1950s Manchester. Very funny (and Jacobson's surfeit of Yiddish flavourings add a satisfying crunch and are an aural delight), yet suffused with melancholy. While comparisons with Philip Roth were inevitable, they're apt. I'd also suggest an affinity with Mordecai Richler, and perhaps Steve Stern and Rebecca Goldstein.
    • 3/5
      A coming of age tale set in England, growing up with ping pong and finding one's place in the world. An interesting premise, i wanted to like this book, but it was a bit dry and I was unable to pick it up once I had put it down. Too bad though. The writing was pretty solid, I can see how some might enjoy it, and I didn't find the Yiddish all that distracting as some have said, most of it you could guess at the meaning pretty easily. This is one I'd like to finish, but there are just other books I'd prefer to read.
    • 5/5
      As far as I'm concerned, The Mighty Walzer soundly trounces The Finkler Question, Jacobson's Booker-winning 2010 novel, much like Oliver Walzer easily defeats opponent after opponent at ping-pong. The Mighty Walzer is funnier and snappier than The Finkler Question and much easier to read as it doesn't get so bogged down in being an Important Modern Jewish Novel, but rather a novel that happens to be about Jewish characters. There are not too many books that make me laugh out loud more than once, but Jacobson has a very natural wit that is distinctly Jewish and yet very accessible no matter what your background. The story is not the most compelling ever written, but what this book really has to offer are its rich and incredibly engaging characters. Highly recommended.
    • 4/5
      This novel was a delight from start to finish. Jacobson writes with wit and clarity but without losing the unique voice of his narrator, Oliver Walzer, who is a rare blend of charming, disgusting, relatable and completely incomprehensible. It’s truly a period piece, giving the reader insight into the world of ping-pong in the 1950s and the life of a Jewish family in Manchester, but doesn’t descend into mere caricature and ridicule despite its long list of odd-ball characters. The Yiddish can be a bit daunting at first, but it fits with the narrative flow so well that it begins to seamlessly blend into the rest of the text.
    • 4/5
      I really like Howard Jacobson’s fluid, wry writing and welcomed the opportunity to snag an advanced reading copy of this book. I thoroughly enjoyed it, even though I know nothing about ping-pong. My Yiddish is pretty good, but I missed a couple of the terms, (had to phone up my mother). The British slang was challenging too, and I lived there for two years. Still, like reading Salman Rushdie or Junot Diaz, it’s possible to handle some foreign language phrases if the storytelling is sound. I sped through this Jewish coming-of-age novel set in 1950s Manchester, in just a few days. Jacobson is often compared to Phillip Roth. There are certainly comparisons to be made, but I feel that Jacobson just doesn’t hate his female characters quite as much. There’s more affection along with the abuse and frequent self-abuse, of all sorts. I thought this book was frequently hilarious and occasionally moving.
    • 4/5
      The Mighty Walzer is a coming-of-age novel served to American readers with a whole lot of backspin. That is because Oliver Walzer, hero of Howard Jacobson’s The Mighty Walzer, did his growing up in 1950s Manchester, England – specifically in a part of Manchester predominately populated by Jewish families like his own. If shyness could kill, Oliver Walzer would never have reached puberty. That he did reach puberty, although he did not do a whole lot with the opportunities inherent to that stage of life, and go on to have a fairly “normal” life almost seems like an accident now, even to Oliver. The first accident was that he found a competition-grade Ping-Pong ball and brought it home with him one day. The second, was his discovery, by banging that ball off a wall with his hardbound copy of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, that he was a Ping-Pong natural. Ping-Pong, and his father’s insistence that Oliver use his unusual skills to meet other players ( as a way of forcing him out of the house for his own good), would be Oliver’s ticket to the rest of his life. Suddenly, he was among like-minded people who came to accept him as one of their own; he had teammates; he learned to at least talk a good game about women, even though he seldom practiced his skills in that arena; and he had a goal: to become a world champion Ping-Pong player. Well, that’s the good news, because I’m making Oliver’s transition to adulthood sound a whole lot easier than it was.The odds were against Oliver from the start. Surrounded by a gaggle of sexually repressed aunts who loved to give him baths, it is little wonder that the little boy would himself be sexually confused. Witness his habit of cutting headshots of his aunts and pasting them onto the bodies of women in the risqué photos he spent hours visiting in the family’s one bathroom. But grow into a man Oliver does, and Howard Jacobson makes it an interesting, if somewhat frustrating transition (even for the reader, who is likely to want to shake some common sense into Oliver, or other family members, on more than one occasion). That Jacobson often uses 1950s British slang and Yiddish references in the conversation between his characters might be off-putting to some, but this adds an authenticity to the conversations that would otherwise be missing – and it becomes easier and easier on the reader as he develops an “ear” for unusual words and phrases. Imagine Philip Roth “squared” and you will have the right first impression of The Mighty Walzer.Rated at: 4.0