Bastards I Have Met - Barry Crump

Published in an omnibus edition "The Essential Crump Collection" containing: "A Good Keen Man"; "Bastards I Have Met"; "Wild Pork and Watercress", by Hodder Moa Beckett Publishers Limited: Auckland, NZ, 2003.
Originally published 1971.

This is the third Barry Crump book I've reviewed here, after Gold and Greenstone and Wild Pork and Watercress. Unlike those other two books, this book (I'm not really all that comfortable with the title) is a collection of short stories, rather than an ongoing (loose) narrative. The thread tying these stories together is that they are all nominally (as the title suggests) b*stards that Crump has 'met'. He arranges the book alphabetically, with one b*stard for each letter of the alphabet (plus a few spares he adds in at the end), even going so far as to create a "Latin" name for each 'species' of b*stard he mentions (such as Bastardus loafus for a 'Lazy B*stard').

Despite the language (which does suit Crump's style) I really enjoyed a number of these stories. In particular, his description of getting towed at high speeds behind the V8 ute of the Indispensable B*stard (Bastardus necessarius) made me laugh - as well as reminding me of a similar occasion in my own life! And that, really, is what makes Crump's stories so successful - his characters are so 'Kiwi' and so real, even if more rural and of a slightly earlier generation. You can absolutely picture someone acting like the characters in this book, and can chuckle along with recognition as well as with the story itself.

Not my favourite Crump book, but it definitely has some high points.

Completed 30 November 2023.

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