About this title: Robbins calls Jitterbug Perfume "an epic". It is also a saga, and a saga must have a hero. The hero of this one is a janitor with a missing bottle. The bottle is blue, very, very old, and embossed with the image of a great-horned god. Some people actually believe that the liquid in the bottle is--the secret essence of the universe?
Note: This is a general synopsis. Each listing is described below.
Binding: Mass Market Paperback
Publisher: Bantam
Date Published: 1985
ISBN-13:9780553251487ISBN:0553251481
Description: Acceptable. Overall below average used book. May have highlighting, underlining, notes, price sticker on cover, or be an ex-library book. read more
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Bantam
Date Published: 1984
ISBN-13:9780553050684ISBN:0553050680
Description: Acceptable. Minor shelf wear with first 2 pages loose from book. GoodwillnyBooks is committed to providing each customer with the highest standard of customer service. You may return new items within 30 days of delivery for a full refund. read more
Description: Good. Dust Cover Missing. Light shelf wear and minimal interior marks. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Description: Acceptable. Book is in good reading condition. Cover has wear at edges and corners, and may have creases. Spine has wear at edges and may have creases. read more
Description: Very Good. 0553268449 Mass Market Paperback, Condition: Very Good; this book is in very good condition with light discoloration due to aging and other light wear. read more
Binding: Trade paperback
Publisher: Bantam Books
Date Published: 1984
ISBN-13:9780553050684ISBN:0553050680
Description: Good. No dust jacket as issued. Top edge of book has chew marks. 342 p. Sewn binding. Cloth over boards. Audience: General/trade. read more
Edition: 4th Printing
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Bantam Books, New York
Date Published: 1984
ISBN-13:9780553251487ISBN:0553251481
Description: No Illustrations. Very Good. No Jacket. ILLUSTRATED PAPERBACK COVER IS FADED WITH LIGHT RUBBING, AND LIGHT STAINING, CORNERS LIGHTLY BUMPED, SMALL TEAR TO HINGE, LIGHT SHELFWEAR TO EDGES. INTERIOR PAGES HAVE LIGHT SOILING. read more
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Bantam
Date Published: 1990
ISBN-13:9780553348989ISBN:0553348981
Description: Very Good. Slight cover wear with minor scuffing to edges. GoodwillnyBooks is committed to providing each customer with the highest standard of customer service. You may return new items within 30 days of delivery for a full refund. read more
"On my 3rd reread, I have determined that this is absolutely one of my favorite books of all time. Self-reliance, individualism, the great god Pan, perfume, beets... this book has it all in classic Tom Robbins style (swoon). One quote that caught my eye this go-round: "Christianity is merely a system for turning priestesses into handmaidens, queens into concubines, and goddesses into muses." And another: "Paris. April. Twilight. A few flat clouds folded themselves like crepes over fillings of apricot sky." And, to epitomize a fave veggie of mine: " The beet is the most intense of vegetables. The radish, admittedly is more feverish, but the fire of the radish is a cold fire, the fire of discontent, not of passion. Tomatoes are lusty enough, yet there runs through tomatoes an undercurrent of frivolity. Beets are deadly serious....The beet is the murderer returned to the scene of the crime. The beet is what happens when the cherry finishes with the carrot. The beet is the ancient ancestor of the autumn moon, bearded, buried, all but fossilized; dark green sails of the grounded moon-boat stitched with veins of primordial plasma; the kite string that once connected the moon to the Earth now a muddy whisker drilling desperately for rubies.""
"...this book was no exception in the entertainment arena. It's hard to beat his bizarre characters. One of the few writers that gets women....big plus in my book!"
"What can I say about Tom Robbins? The man's a freaking rock star.
Jitterbug Perfume is an epic. It's about immortality, religion, individuality, pleasure, our primitive brain (specifically our sense of smell), the ridiculousness of life, conformity, escaping social bounds, and, well, LIFE. It's a love story. It's philosophical. It's a laugh-out-loud comedy routine. It's everything, and without a single cliché in sight.
Sometimes the everything-ness was exhausting, but only because I so desperately wanted--no, needed--to wrap my brain around the entirety of Robbins' message. I constantly felt like I was missing something, and I didn't want to let anything fly over my head. This is difficult because there are so many balls up in the air; one can't help but wonder how it's possible to catch them all. Robbins must have used charts, notes, graphs, large pieces of paper taped together and tacked onto his office walls to write this book. Either that or his editor really kept tabs on things.
The book was released in 1984, and some of the reviews I've read stated that the book is good despite its outdated ideologies. I disagree that Robbins' observations and commentary are outdated. He eloquently stresses certain simple and logical truths that remain quite relevant today: reduced stress can lengthen life span, organisms that consistently feel pleasure and purpose tend to stick around longer, individuality and meaning are being threatened by social constructs that urge us to conform to our surroundings, etc. While the search for immortality is ridiculous and unnatural (to me, at least), the basic tools for prolonging life are important and useful. I'm simplifying his message, but like I said, this book is difficult to summarize.
I couldn't help but wonder about Robbins' current stance on technology, on our "perma-connectedness" via the digital world. Would he say that it hinders individuality, that it's simply another tool we use to disappear and conform within social norms? Or would he think that we are freer to explore meaning and diversity with constant information at our fingertips? I'm not sure about this one. Perhaps I'll have to read some of his more recent work to discover the answer(s)."
"This is my favorite Robbins, could be my favorite book ever (if I had to choose one). Not just funny, charming, tantalizing: it affected my thinking of eternal matters, introduced me painlessly to the Book of the Dead, gave me things to strive for (I once felt I managed the continuous figure-8 breath - briefly, of course).
Even knowing that he was just spinning a tale, I remember realizing that for years I assumed the prescription for not aging would work, if one could just know all the details.
Sweet, savory, haunting"
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