Product Description

A novel which became a film starring Peter Sellers. It is the tale of a simple man accidentally thrown into a world of sex, money, power and national television, to become a media superstar and a household name. The author's other novels include "Steps", which won America's National Book Award.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #88446 in Books
• Published on: 1999-01-01
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 111 pages

From the Back Cover
The hero of this astonishing novel is called Chance - he may be the man of tomorrow. Flung into the real world when his rich benefactor dies, Chance is helped on his life journey by Elizabeth Eve, the young, beautiful, resourceful wife of a dying Wall Street mogul. Accidentally launched into a world of sex, money, power - and national television - he becomes a media superstar, a household name, the man of the hour - and, who knows, perhaps the next President of the United States of America.

About the Author
Jerry Kosinski
Jerzy Kosinski won France's Best Foreign Book Award for The Painted Bird, the National Book Award in Fiction for Steps, and received the American Academy and National Institute of Arts and Letters' Award in Literature. He is also the author of Being There, The Devil Tree, Cockpit, Blind Date, Passion Play and Pinball, and of several non-fiction works. His books have been translated into most major languages.

Mr Kosinski taught English at Wesleyan, Princeton and Yale Universities. He was the President of the American Center of P.E.N., an association of writers and editors, and was active in many human rights organisations. He died in 1991.

Customer Reviews

If you liked Forrest Gump, you'll hate this :-)
I read this years and years ago - and I could not put it down. Look at the world through the eyes of someone with a different viewpoint. Imagine a world where you didn't understand innuendo and sarcasm. Try and believe in a man who is entirely honest, with no understanding of pretence, and no pretence of understanding. That is Chance, the gardener, who's only experience of the world is through the TV - who became Chauncey Gardiner, mover, shaker and advisor to the President. This story is dark, and left me re-examining my view of the world. They made a film of this with Peter Sellers, and nobody really understood the simple humour and the painful observation of us all that made this story a classic. No-one but Sellers could have done it justice. The comparison with Forrest Gump is inescapable - but you have to read this one to make it really work.

A superb fable
Succinct, pithy, brilliant. An earlier review gives the plot outline so I won't repeat it. I saw the film, then read the book, then saw the film again. Apparently Kosinski wrote this book, and then went through it meticulously deleting every line that wasn't absolutely necessary. Hence this is short, to the point, almost a novella, but nothing is missed. A truly superb fable for our time, for any time perhaps, about the danger of assumption and the fact that people fundamentally want to be told the truth.

Good book, good film
Mr Kosinsky writes a good story and it made a good film; but reader: 'What is the connection between the films, 2001 A SPACE ODYSSEY, CATCH-22, BEING THERE and the book THE TROUBLE WITH CEPHAE?' The answer is the theme music - ALSO SPRACH ZARATHUSTRA. It is used in the opening credits of 2001, in CATCH-22, when our hero sees the gorgeous woman walking down the street, in BEING THERE when Peter Sellers is thrown out of his beloved garden, and in the book THE TROUBLE WITH CEPHAE, just before Mark Derringer has his fatal accident. Interesting or what?