The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman : The Complete and Unabridged Edition - Tapa blanda

Tristram Shandy has come to be seen as one of the greatest comic novels in English, as well as a forerunner for many modern narrative devices. As its title suggests, the book is ostensibly Tristram's narration of his life story. But it is one of the central jokes of the novel that he cannot explain anything simply, that he must make explanatory diversions to add context and colour to his tale, to the extent that we do not even reach Tristram's own birth until Volume III. Consequently, apart from Tristram as narrator, the most familiar and important characters in the book are his father Walter, his mother, his Uncle Toby, Toby's servant Trim, and a supporting cast of popular minor characters. Most of the action is concerned with domestic upsets or misunderstandings, which find humour in the opposing temperaments of Walter-splenetic, rational and somewhat sarcastic-and Uncle Toby, who is gentle, uncomplicated and a lover of his fellow man.