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| Portuguese Irregular Verbs | 
 enlarge | Author: Alexander Mccall Smith
Publisher: Random House Large Print Publishing
Category: Book
Buy New: $38.95
New (1) Used (6) from $9.94
Avg. Customer Rating:  54 reviews
Sales Rank: 343521
Format: Large Print
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
ISBN: 0739325671
EAN: 9780739325674
ASIN: 0739325671
Publication Date: January 2006
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: Book is BRAND NEW! First large print edition, no remainder mark.
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Product Description
Is there anything funny about German professors? This novel features the endless mishaps of the inimitable Professor Dr Moritz-Maria von Igelfeld.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 49 more reviews...
 For those who love 'British' humor or perhaps Frasier December 30, 2004
57 out of 62 found this review helpful
The first of three books in the Professor Dr von Igelfeld Series (same author as #1 Ladies Detective...).
Comical episodes surrounding the mishaps of three extremely rigid (and hysterical) German professors who are experts (of course) in their field of language/linguistics (imagine a German version of Fraiser). Racked by guilt and self-certainty, waves of supreme confidence and landslides of self-doubt, their everyday incidents will have you laughing aloud. Fans of Basil Faulty or P. G. Wodehouse and like British-humor will delight in the characters and their very digestible episodes. Each book is quite short (~120 pages) and you'll probably end up with all three.
 Not for everyone, but AMS's talent for writing still amazes! July 10, 2005
45 out of 50 found this review helpful
Under 'Book Description' on this book's Amazon site, reference is made to the "rarified world" of Dr Moritz-Maria von Igelfeld the great philologist (one who studies literary texts to determine their original form and meaning; an older word for 'linguistics'. Can one imagine anything more tedious? or bo-o-r-r-ing?). Rarified, indeed, it is...almost out of the stratosphere. Our dear doctor lives so completely in his head that he misses the point of almost all that goes on around him in the world of the mundane. He is also extraordinarily socially inept. In one instance, he is so concerned that he do things "properly" in approaching the lady he would like to make his wife that in the five weeks he waits to make his initial approach, a friend, on a little faster track, has pursued the lady and asked her to marry him. She has accepted.
Portuguese Irregular Verbs is comprised of eight short stories about events in the lives of three philologists who are friends. Dr von Igelfeld is the primary character. His friends are fellow philologists, Professor Dr Detlev Amadeus Unterholzer and Professor Dr Dr Florianus Prinzel. Germans all.
The stories of Dr Moritz-Maria von Igelfeld are nothing like those of the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency. The humor is very dry and, for some, will be non-existent, or close to it. I think one needs to have lived a while and known a fair number of people to really appreciate this book. I believe that as a result of having read this first book in the series, I better understand a couple people I actually know, and have known for years! I also think I'll delay that trip to Venice I was thinking of taking.
It is a tribute to Mr. Smith's ability to write that he can take such stuffy, one-dimensional people and show them in a humorous light. He is simply terrifico!!
Carolyn Rowe Hill
 Tepid Academic Satire September 13, 2005
22 out of 36 found this review helpful
I have to admit to being somewhat perplexed by those who rave about this book, comparing it to the "British humor" stylings of Wodehouse, John Cleese, the Mr. Bean series, et al. The latter have each made me laugh out loud countless times -- while this slim volume of short stories barely rates a single smirk. Some have suggested that one needs to be somewhat familiar with academia in order to "appreciate" the "subtle" humor involved. Luckily, two of my closest friends are knee-deep in academia (one is a scholar of German philosophy no less!), and it's not that I don't get McCall's little jibes and jests, it's just that they're not particularly amusing. Satires of academia lie thick on the shelves, and the earnest, self-important, bumbling scholar of arcane knowledge is an archetype unto itself. There are plenty of plots revolving around such characters and their infighting, and many (such as David Lodge) do it much better.
In Smith's varitation, we meet Herr Professor Dr. von Igelfeld of the Institute of Romance Philology, the author of a seminal work on Portuguese irregular verbs. The eight stories arranged here (and two subsequent books) follow him through various misadventures. These, alas, are not particularly interesting or funny or insightful or....anything. They just are. We find him in his school days, getting his friend into a saber duel (that should give you a sense of the time frame). As a newly minted PhD. and academic slave we follow him and his awful boss on a bewildering trip to Ireland. There are a few trips to Italy in which bad things happen. There is a trip to India where he meets a murderer and a guru. Back in Germany a trip to the dentist leads to heartache. When joined together, the stories form a portrait of a hapless figure seemingly destined to fail. But again, nothing happens, no insights are made, and generally all one gets is a light roasting of academic pretentiousness.
The only moment in the entire book that lingers at all is a decent comic sequence in which three academics decide to learn to play tennis by reading the rules. Of course they are all so athletically incompetent that no one can hold serve. Thus, according to the rule book no one can seemingly win a game. They decide the game is defective and stop playing. That's kind of a funny image, and one that I might recall in the years to come. But that's it, otherwise the book has nothing to offer and I will not be seeking out the other two in the series.
WELL WORTH IT! November 21, 2004
16 out of 18 found this review helpful
I bought this book from Amazon UK last year because it wasn't
yet published in the U.S. It cost me a good $20.00 with the shipping, but it was well worth it. Entertaining, funny, a good read. McCall Smith came through again. I laughed out loud, good and hard, several times. I highly recommend it.
The Imperfect Subjunctive Has No Insulting Connotations In India September 4, 2006
16 out of 17 found this review helpful
Whether or not it is impossible to insult someone in the imperfect subjunctive tense in Hindi or not (for those of you familiar with Hindi, I defy you to think of an example!), this is a great book. In fact, this very point is debated fiercely by the protagonist, noted philologist Dr Moritz-Maria von Igelfeld (literally "Hedgehog Field" in German) and the noted Indian philologist and author of the classic texts "Dravidian Verb Shifts" and "Terms of Ritual Abuse in the Creditor/Debtor Relationship in Village India," Professor J. G. K. L. Singh of Chandighar.
This is the first volume in a series following the adventures of Dr. von Igelfeld and his associates Professor Dr. Dr. (honoris causa) Florianus Prinzel and Professor Dr. Detlev Amadeus Unterholzer through the arcane riddles of linguistic obfuscation in languages including not only Portuguese, but also German, English, Hindi, and Urdu, just to name a few. Along the way they become involved with a cast of odd characters typical of academia, excessive dental pain (and ensuing romance), a sausage dog named Walter, a guru portending a train wreck, a contest ending in a rather unique dueling scar, and an encyclopedic collection of early Gaelic curse words.
This is a brief, but enjoyable work, and is vastly preferable to the original 1,200 page namesake work by von Igelfeld himself: Alexander McCall Smith has written a winner. For anyone amused by linguistics, stuffy Prussians (hey, who isn't?), or exceedingly improbable situations, this is a great little volume. I am looking forward to the remaining books in the series.
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