Description

Book Synopsis
The three novellas collected in Van Gogh's Room at Arles demonstrate once again Stanley Elkin's mastery of the English language, with exuberant rants on almost every page, unexpected plot twists, and jokes that leave readers torn between laughter and tears. Her Sense of Timing relates a destructive day in the life of a wheelchair-bound professor who is abandoned by his wife at the worst possible time, leaving him to preside -- helplessly -- over a party for his students that careens out of control. The second story in this collection tells of an unsuspecting commoner catapulted into royalty when she catches the wandering eye of Prince Larry of Wales. And in the title story, a community college professor searches for his scholarly identity in a land of academic giants while staying in Van Gogh's famous room at Arles and avoiding run-ins with the Club of the Portraits of the Descendants of the People Painted by Vincent Van Gogh.

Trade Review
"All three novellas in Elkin's latest collection are occasionally funny, often painful and always beautifully written." -- PW "This well-balanced collection stands as a worthy companion to Elkin's first three-novella set, Search es and Seizures." -- Library Journal

Van Gogh's Room at Arles

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    Order before 4pm today for delivery by Wed 1 Jul 2026.

    A Paperback / softback by Stanley Elkin, Chirs Lehmann

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      View other formats and editions of Van Gogh's Room at Arles by Stanley Elkin

      Publisher: Dalkey Archive Press
      Publication Date: 17/04/2003
      ISBN13: 9781564782809, 978-1564782809
      ISBN10: 1564782808

      Description

      Book Synopsis
      The three novellas collected in Van Gogh's Room at Arles demonstrate once again Stanley Elkin's mastery of the English language, with exuberant rants on almost every page, unexpected plot twists, and jokes that leave readers torn between laughter and tears. Her Sense of Timing relates a destructive day in the life of a wheelchair-bound professor who is abandoned by his wife at the worst possible time, leaving him to preside -- helplessly -- over a party for his students that careens out of control. The second story in this collection tells of an unsuspecting commoner catapulted into royalty when she catches the wandering eye of Prince Larry of Wales. And in the title story, a community college professor searches for his scholarly identity in a land of academic giants while staying in Van Gogh's famous room at Arles and avoiding run-ins with the Club of the Portraits of the Descendants of the People Painted by Vincent Van Gogh.

      Trade Review
      "All three novellas in Elkin's latest collection are occasionally funny, often painful and always beautifully written." -- PW "This well-balanced collection stands as a worthy companion to Elkin's first three-novella set, Search es and Seizures." -- Library Journal

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