Books › The Confidence Man
The Confidence Man
572 pages
A surreal, darkly comic riverboat journey that dismantles the illusion of trust and identity through a dizzying series of philosophical cons.
What it feels like
Reading this novel feels like being trapped in a brilliant, claustrophobic parlor game where the rules keep changing and everyone is lying to you. The narrative drifts down the Mississippi at a meandering, episodic pace, entirely abandoning traditional plot in favor of dense, dizzying philosophical dialogues. It is a deeply cynical and surreal experience, wrapping its dark observations about human gullibility and the hollow core of the American Dream in layers of wry, labyrinthine prose. The atmosphere is unsettling yet darkly comic, leaving you constantly second-guessing the motives of every voice on the page. It will thoroughly delight patient readers who crave challenging, intellectually rigorous satires and who enjoy the sensation of the author playing an elaborate trick on them.
- Mood
- surreal
- unsettling
- claustrophobic
- intellectually dizzying
- Tone
- satirical
- cynical
- philosophical
- wry
- elusive
- Pace
- meandering
- Themes
- the illusion of trust · moral ambiguity · shifting identities · the dark side of the American Dream · human gullibility
- The writing
- Dense, labyrinthine, and heavily layered with irony, philosophical digressions, and elaborate rhetorical flourishes.
- The arc
- The journey begins with curious amusement at a parade of eccentric characters, slowly sinking into a profound, unsettling paranoia where no truth can be trusted.
- Who it's for
- Readers who delight in challenging, plotless satires and love untangling dense philosophical dialogues about the darkness of human nature.
Content notes
- period-typical racism
- ableism
About the book
Onboard the Fidele, a steamboat floating down the Mississippi to New Orleans, a confidence man sets out to defraud his fellow passengers. In quick succession he assumes numerous guises - from a legless beggar and a worldly businessman to a collector for charitable causes and a 'cosmopolitan' gentleman, who simply swindles a barber out of the price of a shave. Making very little from his hoaxes, the pleasure of trickery seems an end in itself for this slippery conman. Is he the Devil? Is his chicanery merely intended to expose the mercenary concerns of those around him? Set on April Fool's Day, The Confidence-Man (1857) is an engaging comedy of masquerades, digressions and shifting identity, and a devastating satire on the American dream.
Description from Open Library.
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