Literary Fiction · ThoughtfulA depressed professor spends a spring weekend in 1970 while the novel he is writing unfolds inside the book
The Hair of Harold Roux
A professor writing a novel goes through a long weekend in a New Hampshire college town
Aaron Benham is a depressed literature professor at a New Hampshire college, on leave to write a novel. His work is interrupted by phone calls: a missing student's mother, then the wife of a colleague whose dissertation has stalled. He forgets his in-laws' anniversary and is left behind by his family. Around these events, his novel unfolds, following two college friends after World War II, Allard Benson and Harold Roux, who wears a toupee.
More about this book
Who
Aaron Benham, a professor, his colleague George and George's wife Helga, and in the embedded novel, Allard Benson and Harold Roux.
World
A New Hampshire college in spring 1970, over a long weekend, and a college after World War II.
What makes it different
It nests several stories: Aaron's weekend, Allard's novel, which itself includes Harold's novel, and a bedtime fairy tale. It fell out of print after its award and returned in 2011, and Stephen King has called it a favorite.
Feel
Reflective and layered. It shared the 1975 National Book Award for Fiction with Robert Stone's Dog Soldiers.
Page count and cover shown for: Selected edition
Further reading
- The Hair of Harold RouxWikipedia