Moab is My Washpot

He takes the autobiography genre and makes it his own entirely. One of the newspaper quotes on the back says that he is one of the great originals - and this book shows that in it's content as much as the way that it's written.

The research, the physical, and mostly emotional effort and the amount of himself that he has poured into it is incredible.

Beyond the phenomenal honesty and integrity of his writing, the insight to his incredible life and unsurpassed brain is brilliant. Stephen Hawking's A Brief History of Time has "We journey into Hawking's universe, while marveling at his mind" on the front. I agreed with that at the time - this book and author deserve the title more.

In negative news it is rushed at the end - very much so in fact. Part of me doesn't want to doubt this, since it's a long book already and I want to believe that there is good reason for cutting it short, but in reality hearing more about his depression and jail time would have been good. Perhaps he just couldn't bring himself to write it, who knows.

WOW! deary deary dear! (1/2 people found this helpful)

I have read many books from The Odyssey by Homer to Animal Farm by George Orwell and this, this is my favourite book of all time!

Genius, Genius, Genius!

At times intensly funny and at times almost unbearably sad.
All I can say is you need to beg, borrow or steal and get this book. It's just brilliant.

fantastic read (1/1 people found this helpful)

like all stephen fry's book this one was brilliant. a fantastic author. once i started reading i could hardly put it down. it's got me started on reading all of his others.

A thoroughly delightful read (3/3 people found this helpful)

I must admit I approached "Moab Is My Washpot" with a tiny bit of trepidation, fearing a bit of a luvvie's memoirs of his time in the theatre and the Cambridge footlights and so on. I am not a bona fide fan of Stephen Fry as such so I was pleasantly surprised to discover that the book was such a delightful, poignant, moving and amusing read. It largely takes in the time from his birth to when he gets accepted at Cambridge. For anyone who had a middle-class upbringing in the sixties this book will undoubtedly bring back so many memories - of delightful primary school activities, of school fetes, of bullying grammar/public school teachers, of the hierarchy of children. It is told in a sensitive, affectionate, sometimes self-deprecating but never indulgent way. Fry's recollections are those shared by so many of us - resentful that we didn't win a primary school competition and so on - and he manages to recall certain characters from his youth with such genuine affection. The descriptions of the kindlier of his teachers is some of the most appreciative, evocative and genuine kind writing I have read in a long time.

Fry realises when his behaviour was worthy of shame and opens his heart honestly and accordingly, yet he is never mawkish, merely breathtakingly sincere. Even his accounts of his crush on a younger boy are touching in the extreme, even for one who has not experienced such a thing, it was so vividly described, that one found oneself appreciating the boy's beauty oneself ! In general the school passages are magnificent in every way. Fry really takes the reader into that world which now seems so very long ago.

In keeping with the man, there are also many touches of humour but it is nearly all dealt with a not inconsiderable pathos. Stephen Fry is a gentleman and a scholar. I could not put this book down and enjoyed every page of it.

Brilliant (2/2 people found this helpful)

Like many of the other reviewers, I found I couldn't put this book down. True some of the language gets a bit complicated in places but Fry's amazing narrative style is so addictive that the few stumbling parts are easily forgiven. It's brilliantly funny, heart-breakingly sad and refreshingly honest, after reading it I would challenge anyone not to feel even slightly moved. Personally I felt a whole rainbow of emotions and I am so glad I read it. I would recommend this to anyone.

Stephen Fry

Reader Reviews:

Incredibly Honest (0/0 people found this helpful)

WOW! deary deary dear! (1/2 people found this helpful)

fantastic read (1/1 people found this helpful)

A thoroughly delightful read (3/3 people found this helpful)

Brilliant (2/2 people found this helpful)

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