A Horse Walks into a Bar

Author(s): David Grossman

General Fiction

WINNER OF THE INTERNATIONAL MAN BOOKER PRIZE 2017

One of the world's great writers venturing into exciting new territory - a heartbreaking, visceral novel about a stand-up comedian


WINNER OF THE INTERNATIONAL MAN BOOKER PRIZE 2017

The setting is a comedy club in a small Israeli town. An audience that has come expecting an evening of amusement instead sees a comedian falling apart on stage; an act of disintegration, a man crumbling, as a matter of choice, before their eyes. They could get up and leave, or boo and whistle and drive him from the stage, if they were not so drawn to glimpse his personal hell. Dovaleh G, a veteran stand-up comic - charming, erratic, repellent - exposes a wound he has been living with for years- a fateful and gruesome choice he had to make between the two people who were dearest to him.

A Horse Walks into a Bar is a shocking and breathtaking read. Betrayals between lovers, the treachery of friends, guilt demanding redress. Flaying alive both himself and the people watching him, Dovaleh G provokes both revulsion and empathy from an audience that doesn't know whether to laugh or cry - and all this in the presence of a former childhood friend who is trying to understand why he's been summoned to this performance.


Product Information

Winner: Man Booker International Prize, 2017.

David Grossman is the bestselling author of numerous works, which have been translated into thirty-six languages. His most recent novels were To the End of the Land, described by Jacqueline Rose as 'without question one of the most powerful and moving novels I have ever read', and Falling Out of Time. He is the recipient of the French Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres and the 2010 Frankfurt Peace Prize.

General Fields

  • : 9781784704223
  • : Random House UK
  • : VINTAGE ARROW - MASS MARKET
  • : June 2017
  • : June 2017
  • : books

Special Fields

  • : David Grossman
  • : Paperback