Literary Fiction
The World According to Garp
Born to the fiercely independent nurse and eventual feminist icon Jenny Fields, T. S. Garp grows from an unconventional child into a wrestler, husband, father, and novelist. His effort to build a safe domestic life repeatedly collides with adultery, ideological conflict, public notoriety, random violence, and the unruly consequences of love. John Irving combines family saga, literary satire, embedded fiction, and dark comedy to examine gender, parenthood, artistic ambition, and mortality. Often included among classic novels to read, the book is memorable less for offering a settled worldview than for exposing how fear and certainty can deform human relationships.
Available editions
- Hardcover First U.S. edition ISBN-13: 9780525237709 437 pages