The Inner Circle [Englisch] [Gebundene Ausgabe]

Following his spirited counterculture drama Drop City (2003), Boyle fictionalizes a historical figure as he did in The Road to Wellville (1994), an unforgettable portrait of Dr. John Harvey Kellogg, this time presenting an intrepid and astute interpretation of the revolutionary work and fanatic personality of sex researcher Dr. Alfred Kinsey. A zoologist at Indiana University called Prok by his intimates, he is seen through the worshipful eyes of John Milk, a handsome, obedient, and clueless English major who becomes Prok's first disciple. Milk joins Prok in his prodigious effort to interview thousands of men and women about their sexual experiences as World War II rages, and Milk is both dedicated to the project and conflicted over Prok's attempt to control every aspect of his life, not to mention his insistence on their having sex. Milk is a meticulous and moody narrator, and Boyle has never written more ravishing and poignant descriptions than those depicting Milk's inner turmoil as reflected in Indiana's extreme weather and the tawdry settings in which they conduct their tricky research, which, as Prok becomes famous, grows increasingly voyeuristic and exhibitionistic. Adamantly clinical, Prok dismisses all sexually related emotions as products of uptight social conventions, but as Milk and his wife, Iris, the novel's moral compass, discover, there's no divorcing feelings from sexuality. Boyle's vision of Kinsey as both genius and cult leader is mesmerizing and chilling as he discerningly explores the consequences of a mechanistic view of humanity, and of signing one's life, and conscience, over to a zealot. Strong medicine from a phenomenally artistic, morally inquisitive, and unfailingly compassionate writer. Donna Seaman
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'It's high time Boyle was deified.' Uncut 'He's a consummate entertainer. A verbal showman. An explosively gifted satirist.' New York Times Book Review

Die Geschichte von John Milk, einem schüchternen, sexuell unerfahrenen jungen Mann, der in den 40er Jahren Assistent von Alfred C. Kinsey wurde, dem berühmten Zoologen und Pionier in der Erforschung der menschlichen Sexualität.

"There are only three types of sexual abnormality: abstinence, celibacy, and delayed marriage." - Alfred Kinsey It is 1939. In the campus of Indiana University a revolution has begun. The stir is caused by Alfred Kinsey, a zoologist who is determined to take sex out of the bedroom. John Milk, a freshman, is enthralled by the professor's daring lectures. Over the next two decades, he becomes Kinsey's right hand man and helps him research The Sexual Behaviour in the Human Male and The Sexual Behaviour in the Human Female, the first ever bestsellers about sex. But Kinsey's zeal has dangerous limits and Milk finds himself drawn into his mentor's sexual inner circle a circle from which he is never, ever, able to break out. Combining epic storytelling with his penchant for the bizarre, T.C. Boyle is back and better than ever.

T. Coraghessan Boyle wurde 1948 in Peekskill, New York im Hudson Valley geboren. Er war Lehrer an der dortigen High-School und publizierte während dieser Zeit seine ersten Kurzgeschichten. Heute lebt er in Kalifornien und unterrichtet an der University of Southern California in Los Angeles Creative Writing. Sein 1987 erschienener Roman "World's End" brachte ihm höchstes Lob der Kritik. Noch im selben Jahr erhielt Boyle den PEN/Faulkner-Preis.