In Australian slang, an illywhacker is a country fair con man, an unprincipled seller of fake diamonds and dubious tonics. And Herbert Badgery, the 139-year-old narrator of Peter Carey's uproarious novel, may be the king of them all. Vagabond and charlatan, aviator and car salesman, seducer and patriarch, Badgery is a walking embodiment of the Australian national character—espcially of its proclivity for tall stories and barefaced lies.
As Carey follows this charming scoundrel across a continent and a century, he creates a crazy quilt of outlandish encounters, with characters that include a genteel dowager who fends off madness with an electric belt and a ravishing young girl with a dangerous fondness for rooftop trysts. Boldly inventive, irresistibly odd, Illywhacker is further proof that Peter Carey is one of the most enchanting writers at work in any hemisphere.
- ISBN10 0679767908
- ISBN13 9780679767909
- Publish Date 30 April 1996 (first published 15 April 1985)
- Publish Status Active
- Out of Print 13 July 2011
- Publish Country US
- Imprint Random House USA Inc
- Format Paperback (US Trade)
- Pages 608
- Language English
- URL https://penguinrandomhouse.com/books/isbn/9780679767909