The Material

(Hardback, Main)

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Description

At the Chicago Stand-Up School celebrated comedians teach students how to be funny. That's the theory. But comedians are rivalrous and tend to see others as the enemy. When super-famous Manny Reinhardt arrives as a guest lecturer, staff and students are polarised between wanting to learn from his genius, and to prosecute him for his much-publicised problems with women.

On an eventful day, several lives collide. Among the students Artie is probably too handsome for comedy, Olivia too reluctant to face her past, Phil to risk offence. On the faculty, Kruger spends too much time trying to command his father's respect, Ashbee is tired of sleeping with white women who congratulate themselves for his Blackness, and Dorothy - the only woman on staff - is wondering how her talent is connected to her loneliness.

In exquisite shifts of perspective, The Material examines life through the eyes of a band of outsiders who are trying to turn their difficulties into entertainment. Welcome to the stage, Camille Bordas, a novelist as skilful, compelling and surprising as the best stand-ups.

Reviews

'A novel about an MFA program for stand-up comics better be damned funny, and The Material is definitely that. It's also profound, deeply engrossing, dark and generous, a great novel about humans making art right now' - Sam Lipsyte

'The comedian as the aptest illustration of contemporary morality...What begins as a clever conceit becomes an interrogation of sadness itself.' - Rachel Cusk, author of Outline

'Utterly charming . . . moving, witty, funny, and especially wonderful for the mature kind-heartedness of its view of humanity. Bordas is an invaluable new voice' - George Saunders

'This novel is so smart. The science of comedy, it turns out, is no laughing matter, but it is nothing but funny. Camille Bordas has exposed the "material" of stand-up by making stand-up her material. Writing comedy is difficult enough, but writing comedy bits that fail and comedy bits that succeed requires some brilliance. That brilliance is on display here' - Percival Everett

'Funny, humane and slyly philosophical' - Zadie Smith

Author Bio

Camille Bordas is the author of three previous prize-winning novels. The third, How to Behave in a Crowd, was the first she wrote in English. The earlier two, Partie Commune and Les Treize Desserts, were written in her native French. Her short stories regularly appear in the New Yorker. Born in France, raised in Mexico City and Paris, she currently lives in Chicago.