Help! Rappaport's come to town!
Five years of absolute silence, and suddenly here he is, in London, come to see Friedlander, his oldest and closest friend.
Rappaport and Friedlander! Friedy and Rap! R and F! Was there ever such a friendship, such togetherness, such a warmth (and nothing homosexual, close your dirty mouth) between two men? Always at the movies together, or gorging in restaurants, or out madly chasing knock-kneed girls -- what a combination! Inseparable! Practically Siamese Twins!
But wait a minute, is this the old Rappaport? Good God, he's balding, he's making unspeakable noises, he's running up huge telephone bills. He's upsetting Kerry, Friedlander's beautiful wife. He's waking the baby. He's filling Friedlander's flat with... smelly old junk! And he's not interested in going to the movies.
"Help!" cries Friedlander.
What's happened to the greatest friendship known to man? This can't be the real Rappaport. Or is it (God forbid) Friedlander who has changed?
And what exactly is Rappaport's revenge?
Morris Lurie writes with a light and unerring touch. The fate of R and F's undying friendship makes not only a wild comic novel but a touching and perceptive comment on the frailties and fallibilities of human relationships.
Rappaport
London
:
Hodder and Stoughton
,
1966
Z237604
1966
single work
novel
humour
'Why can't life be as simple as a Chippendale chair? For Rappaport, antique dealer, magazine fanatic, cake eater extraordinaire, it is anything but. A girl he hardly knows decides to marry him, his best friend Friedlander is giving up his prince of a job in advertising to paint some obscure Greek island, there's not a single Marx Brothers movie showing in the whole of Melbourne ... will Rappaport live through the day? If it wasn't so funny, it'd be desperate, but funny it is, though peeping round the edges of this one wild day in Rappaport's life is a penetrating picture of young people today.'
Source: Publisher's blurb (1977 Angus and Robertson edition)
