Falstaff Hardcover – 2 Sept. 1976

the first few pages fell out as soon as the book was opened

A big, fat, sprawling, rambling fartblast of a book ~ narrated by the vainest, fattest, most cowardly, melancholy knight of them all, hotfoot from the pages of one William Shakespeare, and joyously transformed, or perhaps translated, into novel form by Robert Nye, in a virtuoso performance.Read, laugh, weep, and laugh again!

This is a very entertaining book, beautifully written and carefully researched, configured as the memoirs of Shakespeare's larger-than-life comic character. It's one of Robert Nye's earlier books, and it doesn't have the conciseness and pace that are characteristic of his later works, but it is nevertheless very entertaining and also informative in terms of period detail. In its detailing of the sometimes far-fetched tales of bravado and erotic intrigue it delineates the last, faltering year of its hero with a touching pathos. Most enjoyable.

Sir John Falstaff. A name known to all. However, apart from Shakespeare's portrayal of him in three plays, little has been known about the man himself - until now. Robert Nye here presents the unexpurgated memoirs of the fat King, transcribed and edited in modern spelling. The atmosphere and texture of life in the late 14th and early 15th centuries are marvellously evoked. Falstaff stands revealed as the spirit of England personified - for surely he is the original John Bull, rival to the Gargantua and Pantagruel of Rabelais.In one hundred chapters, covering the period from Sir John's impropable begetting to his unexpected demise, the reader learns about Falstaff when young, and the indignity suffered by him at the hands of the Duchess of Norfolk; about his belly and his rat; about how he went to war and made his name terrible to the enemy; about how he fell in love; about how he conducted the militia at the siege of Kildare; about Prince Hal; about who killed Hotspur; about Agincourt, and how Sir John was installed as a Knight of the Garter; about his friends, and his enemies; and about much, much more.Here 'is' England. 'Falstaff' is a book for our times, unashamedly patriotic but far from uncritical. Robert Nye has welded his raw material into a novel worthy of its protagonist - big in every sense of the word. Here is a racy narrative, a fund of superb stories, a host of larger than life characters, a tapestry of the middle ages. It is funny, touching, witty, tragic, scabrous, poetic. The past becomes the present before your eyes. 'Falstaff' pulsates with life and energy. 'Falstaff' is a feast of a book. 'Falstaff' is an experience you will not willingly forget.

Robert Nye's 'Falstaff' is nothing short of a tour de force of imaginative writing.It takes Shakespeare's much-loved rascally old knight , and looks at his life beyond the pages of the plays , both before and after.We get a wonderfully drawn picture of late medieval England , warts and all.Its by turns poignant , horrific , pitiful and laugh-out-loud hilarious , all described in loving detail by the old rogue as he looks back on his life from the security of his castle at Caister in Norfolk.The full panoply of 15th century life is here from the lowest cutpurses to princes of the realm.Be warned , though ;Nye spares no blushes in his romp through the age of Prince Hal/King Harry.This book is bawdy with a capital 'b'.Falstaff's memoirs are peppered with no-holds-barred amorous adventures from hayloft to nunnery (!)as well as tall tales from the wars in France.This is exhilarating , brilliantly realised stuff ,and you will come away loving the fat knight even more.Hugely recommended.