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Imprint: Jonathan Cape
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Published: 06/10/2016
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ISBN: 9781910702499
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Length: 184 Pages
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Dimensions: 247mm x 20mm x 178mm
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Weight: 661g
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RRP: £16.99
Notes on a Thesis
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Tiphaine Rivière
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Francesca Barrie (Translator)
‘This is a book for anyone who has ever laboured under a deadline, battled a stubborn pig of a boss, or half drowned beneath a wave of bureaucracy and paperwork. Put off what you intended to do today and go out and buy it, right now.’
Rachel Cooke, Observer
An Observer Book of the Year
Shortlisted for the TA First Translation Prize 2017
When Jeanne is accepted on to a PhD course, she is over the moon, brimming with excitement and grand plans – but is the world ready for her masterful analysis of labyrinth motifs in Kafka’s The Trial?
At first Jeanne throws herself into research with great enthusiasm, but as time goes by, it becomes clear that things aren’t quite going according to plan.
Notes on a Thesis is a reminder of the strangeness of academia, of every awful essay, every disastrous exam, and every insanity-inducing dissertation. If you’ve ever stared gloomily at a blank page, battled with office administrators or driven yourself (and everyone you know) mad by droning on about your work, then Notes on a Thesis will make you laugh (or cry) in recognition.
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Imprint: Jonathan Cape
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Published: 06/10/2016
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ISBN: 9781910702499
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Length: 184 Pages
-
Dimensions: 247mm x 20mm x 178mm
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Weight: 661g
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RRP: £16.99
Reviews
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A hilarious, consistently clever account of the author’s struggle to complete her PHD.
Rachel Cooke, Observer, Book of the Year
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[A] delightfully expressive graphic novel... laced with dark, self-deprecating humour... Rivière’s languid linework transforms Jeanne’s daily grind into spot-on visual metaphors... What could be a rambling plunge into misery instead unfolds as a truthful, witty tale, relatable whether readers are Ph.D., ABD, or neither.
Publishers Weekly
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In a genre still dominated by boys/men with super-exciting lives, this tale of an intense, anxious young woman pulling her hair out over the credibility of her labyrinth-motif angle on Kafka makes for an unusual, but very funny and satisfying read. If you're looking for the female Woody Allen of graphic novels...this could be the answer.
Jane Graham, Big Issue
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Quite possibly the funniest book about academic life since David Lodge’s Changing Places. How brilliantly she captures its veiled bitchiness; how expertly – yet lovingly too – she sends up the silly cul-de-sacs of scholarship… This is a book for anyone who has ever laboured under a deadline… Put off what you intended to do today and go out and buy it, right now.
Rachel Cooke, Observer
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A hilariously accurate satire of academia, and a wrenching portrait of obsession.
Stephen Collins, author of 'The Gigantic Beard That Was Evil'
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A tale of procrastination, played for laughs both visually and narratively. Paris - both exterior and interior - is drawn beautifully... The book demonstrates an amusing honesty about the world of education from both sides.
Peter Redrup, Quietus
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A sharp new graphic novel exploring the perils of postgraduate life… [A] darkly comic book.
Matthew Reisz, Times Higher Education
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Funny, troubling and close to the bone for anyone with a life in academia... Rivière is a master of humour and heart-breaking honesty.
Roma Havers, Mancunion
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Caveat: do not read this wry and ever so well observed graphic novel if you have just this second committed yourself to a three-year PhD. The rest of us lucky pups who left academia behind decades ago - or never moored there in the first place - will have a whale of a time, but you will probably cry.
Stephen Holland, Page 45
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In a similar vein to Posy Simmond's Tamara Drewe, Rivière uses a classic text to illustrate the modern world. The gates of Kafka's imagination become her own.
Mollie Davidson, Forge Press
