| Jitterbug Perfume | |
| Author | Tom Robbins |
|---|---|
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Novel |
| Publisher | Bantam USA |
| Publication date | 1984 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| Pages | 342 pp (first edition, hardback) |
| ISBN | ISBN 0-553-05068-0 (first edition, hardback) |
Jitterbug Perfume is Tom Robbins' fourth novel, published in 1984. Thomas Eugene Robbins (born July 22, 1936 in Blowing Rock, North Carolina) is an American Author. The United States of America —commonly referred to as the English is a West Germanic language originating in England and is the First language for most people in the United Kingdom, the United States A novel (from Italian novella, Spanish novela, French nouvelle for "new" "news" or "short story Publishing is the process of production and dissemination of Literature or Information &ndash the activity of making information available for public view Bantam Books is a major US publishing house owned by Random House and is part of the Bantam Dell Publishing Group The year 1984 in literature involved some significant events and new books A hardcover (or hardback or hardbound) is a Book bound with rigid protective covers (typically of cardboard covered with Cloth Paperback, softback, or softcover describe and refer to a Book by the nature of its binding. Thomas Eugene Robbins (born July 22, 1936 in Blowing Rock, North Carolina) is an American Author. Year 1984 ( MCMLXXXIV) was a Leap year starting on Sunday (link displays the 1984 Gregorian calendar) The major themes of the book include the striving for immortality, the meaning behind the sense of smell, individual expression, self-reliance, sex, love, and religion. Beets and the god Pan figure prominently. The beet or beetroot is a Flowering plant species ( Beta vulgaris) in the family Chenopodiaceae. Pan ( Greek, Genitive) is the Greek god of shepherds and flocks of mountain wilds hunting and rustic music paein means to pasture The novel is a self-described epic, with four distinct storylines, one set in 8th century Bohemia and three others in modern day New Orleans, Seattle, and Paris. Bohemia (Čechy; Bohemia Czechy is a historical region in central Europe, occupying the western two-thirds of the traditional Czech Lands, currently the New Orleans (nʲuːˈɔrliənz nʲuːˈɔrlənz French: La Nouvelle-Orléans) is a major United States port city and the largest city in Louisiana Paris (ˈpærɨs in English; in French) is the Capital of France and the country's largest city
Contents |
Plot summary
A powerful and righteous 8th century king named Alobar narrowly escapes regicide at the hands of his own subjects, as it is their custom to kill the king at the first sight of aging. The 8th century is the period from 701 to 800 in accordance with the Julian calendar in the Christian / Common Era. The broad definition of regicide is the deliberate killing of a Monarch, or the person responsible for it After fleeing, no longer a king but a simple peasant, he travels through Eurasia, and eventually meets the goat-god Pan, who is slowly losing his powers as the world turns toward Christianity. For the superstate in George Orwell 's novel see Nations of Nineteen Eighty-Four. Christianity ( Greek Χριστιανισμός from the word Xριστός ( Christ)is a monotheistic Religion centered on the life and teachings In India, he bumps into the adult incarnation of a child he used to know, Kudra, who goes on to become his wife. India, officially the Republic of India (भारत गणराज्य inc-Latn Bhārat Gaṇarājya; see also other Indian languages) is a country As with most of Robbins' couples, their mutual libido is enormous, and their love quite like something out of a fairy tale.
After an encounter with a mysterious group known as "The Bandaloop Doctors" Alobar is set down the path towards eternal life (which, according to Robbins, can be attained by a consistent ritual of controlled breath work, sex and bathing). Alobar and Kudra, successful in their immortality, prance about Europe until the 18th Century, when they attempt a sort of new transcendental meditation and become separated into different astral planes. The 18th century lasted from 1701 to 1800 in the Gregorian calendar, in accordance with the Anno Domini / Common Era numbering system Transcendental Meditation or TM is the trademarked name of a Meditation technique introduced in 1958 by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi (1917-2008 This article is about a plane of existence In the context of Unicode, Astral characters consist of planes above the Basic Multilingual Plane.
Meanwhile, in present-day, a "genius waitress" named Priscilla struggles with a difficult job in a low-end Mexican restaurant. Priscilla is an amateur perfumer, and is slowly going crazy trying to locate a base note for her new fragrance, something she believes will be almost magical, a fragrance she discovered in the gift of a thousand-year-old bottle. Perfume is a mixture of fragrant Essential oils and Aroma compounds Fixatives and Solvents used to give the human body animals objects and living While dealing with this, she also juggles the unwanted advances of a lesbian co-worker, a brief affair with an eccentric millionaire obsessed with life extension, and a mysterious stranger who keeps delivering beets to her apartment.
In New Orleans, Priscilla's stepmother, the Madame Devalier, is a successful perfumer, and is also working on a fragrance of her own, intent on taking on the big companies of Paris. She also seeks something magical — the ultra-fragrant jasmine from a mysterious man with the helmet of swarming bees, Bingo Pajama. Jasmine or Jessamine ( Jasminum) (from Persian yasmin, ie "gift from God" via Arabic) is a Genus of Shrubs
In Paris, the LeFever Parfumaire is concerned about their eccentric leader, Marcel, who equates smell as the most important factor in the forward movement of the evolutionary process. Paris (ˈpærɨs in English; in French) is the Capital of France and the country's largest city After witnessing an eclipse, he is obsessed with his own scent. An eclipse is an astronomical event that occurs when one Celestial object moves into the shadow of another
The story lines eventually converge into a climax in New Orleans, with a brief stop in another dimension. The main message is summarized in the cryptic Erleichda, loosely translated as "lighten up".
Trivia
*In the somewhat esoteric final lines of the book, note this: "And then you'll be blue. Bluer than indigo. " This is based on an old Chinese proverb by Xun Zi: blue dye is made from indigo colored grass, yet the blue dye's color is much deeper than the color of its origin. Xun Zi ( ca 300 – 230 BCE was a Chinese Confucian Philosopher who lived during the Warring States Period and contributed Indigo is the Color on the Electromagnetic spectrum between about 420 and 450 nm in Wavelength, placing it between Blue and violet In other words, the pupil can exceed the master.
External links
Release details
- Hardcover – ISBN 0-553-05068-0, published in 1984 by Bantam Books
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