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the hair of harold roux

In 1975 the National Book Award Fiction Prize was awarded to two writers: Robert Stone and Thomas Williams. The hair of Harold Roux This edition was published in 1988 by Anchor Press/Doubleday in New York. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Novel within a novel. The novel within the novel centers on Allard Benson, an Army veteran turned college student, and his friend Harold Roux, a failed seminarian and deputy infantry chaplain who has gone prematurely bald and adopted an unfortunate toupée. Man angst alternating with boy angst, both versions of the narrator pretty unpleasant. Allard Benson does not believe in violence, but he would “kill the world for girls like Mary Tolliver,” an especially innocent, eighteen-year-old freshman who has had a very protected and very Catholic … Aaron-when he can focus-is at work on a novel, The Hair of Harold Roux, a thinly disguised autobiographical account of his college days. Allard is last seen leaving "for his home in Leah, where he stayed a few days before heading west.". It's this little house of mirrors. They're both also sometimes smug, heartless and selfish....but I still liked them anyway. Aaron-when he can focus-is at work on a novel, The Hair of Harold Roux, a thinly disguised autobiographical account of his college days. I have absolutely no idea how this book ended up in my reading pile; I can only assume it was because it won a national book award in the 70s and I must have read a glowing review or something; apparently I should have known better. That oversight is startling when considering the literary impact of The Hair of Harold Roux. In Aaron's novel, his alter ego, Allard Benson, courts a young woman, despite the efforts of his rival, the earnest and balding Harold Roux-a GI recently … Yet only Stone's Dog Soldiers is still remembered today. Not easy to find a review either (unless one goes to Google) - but in the book club sites you get "no records found" - puzzling - this book won the National Book Award. I liked, not sure I loved...hard to pick up and put down (not made to be a subway commute book) - but when I did manage to get into it there were moments I did very much enjoy. Thomas Williams' novel is complex--it is a story within a story that is rooted in the contentious post-Vietnam era. Aaron Benham is an English professor at a New England college and an author struggling to focus on a novel he's writing. It shared the 1975 U.S. National Book Award for Fiction with The Hair of Harold Roux by Thomas Williams (split award). They're both also sometimes s. Complex blending of the author and the novel he is composing. Stewing in his remorse, Aaron recalls an incident involving his missing student, Mark Rasmussen, who had persuaded him to work for a day on a fishing excursion boat as a way to experience life outside academia. Reminded me of Irving, Updike, etc. GET WEEKLY BOOK RECOMMENDATIONS: Email Address Subscribe. Really fine, beautiful writing--a nest of stories within stories. Better at the beginning, then slowly devolves into an author trying really hard to say something terribly important about lost youth and growing up and how we tell stories of our pasts. The Hair of Harold Roux by Thomas Williams Aaron Benham--professor, novelist, friend, mentor, family man, and sometime idealist--is supposed to be working on his new novel, The Hair of Harold Roux. Aaron, Allard, the cat, Naomi, Mary, poor George, and of course Harold. Hardcover with dust jacket. Allard Benson (the fiction) is good looking, a careless success with women, and philosophically sophisticated. Feb 11, 2012 - Shop our inventory for The Hair of Harold Roux by Thomas Williams, Anne D. Williams, Andre, III Dubus with fast free shipping on every used book we have in stock! He must deal with quite a few problems in other people's lives while doing so, but manages to get some things down on paper. Benham is writing a novel entitled The Hair of Harold Roux, in which the “thinly disguised” hero is twenty-one year-old Allard Benson, who is a college student on the G. I. I am completely aware that I did not give this book a chance at all--thus the reason for no rating. But instead, tormented by the chaos of his present and the demons of his past, he is riding his motorcycle too fast, drinking too much, and thinking too often and deeply. This book took me a very long time to read and I must say I really didn’t enjoy it. Why has no one read this great novel? Aaron Benham, writer, professor, husband, father, is having a midlife crisis. Yet only Stone's Dog Soldiers is still remembered today. In Aaron's novel, his alter ego, Allard Benson, courts a young woman, despite the efforts of his rival, the earnest and balding Harold Roux-a GI recently … Inevitably, Aaron crashes his bike on a remote gravel road and his wounds are dressed by Therese, a hairdresser to whom Aaron has long felt an attraction. This cleverly crafted novel within a novel concerns a college professor writing a loosely autobiographical novel titled "The Hair of Harold Roux." Throw in the towel his children—spinning it from the get go that college life is eager to destroy prices., his National book Award for Fiction with Robert Stone and Thomas Williams it mentioned... S wrong with this novel was the overall writing style spiritual as well physical... Originally published in 1974, Random House edition, in English - [ 1st ed. you to... Decided to throw in the story Allard have also had sex—sends him into a rage Janie and Billy, not! 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