John Kennedy Toole
New Orleans, Orleans Parish, Louisiana
Marker Inscription
“In the shadow under the green visor of the cap, Ignatius J. Reilly’s supercilious blue and yellow eyes looked down upon the other people waiting under the clock at the D. H. Holmes Department Store, studying the crowd of people for signs of bad taste in dress." John Kennedy Toole A Confederacy Of Dunces 1981 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.
The Story
New Orleans author John Kennedy Toole created Ignatius J. Reilly, the unforgettable misanthrope of 'A Confederacy of Dunces,' whose opening scene unfolds beneath the clock at the old D.H. Holmes department store on Canal Street. Toole died before the novel found a publisher; his mother championed the manuscript, and it appeared in 1980. In 1981 it won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.
Why it matters
The novel became a beloved portrait of New Orleans itself, and its posthumous triumph is one of American literature's great underdog stories.
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