In 1984, Anthony Burgess published Ninety-Nine Novels, a selection of his favourite novels in English since 1939. The list is typically idiosyncratic, and shows the breadth of Burgess’s interest in fiction. This podcast, by the International Anthony Burgess Foundation, explores the novels on Burgess’s list with the help of writers, critics and other special guests.

In this episode, novelist and academic Norman Ravvin joins us to talk about Cocksure by Mordecai Richler, a novel Anthony Burgess called ‘grimly funny’.

Cocksure tells the story of Mortimer Griffin, a publisher whose routine life collides with the world of the Star Maker, a grotesque Hollywood movie producer who buys Mortimer’s publishing house and sets his life on a downward spiral. Mortimer suffers a breakdown of his marriage, has to contend with a school teaching the children the work of Marquis de Sade, and begins to question his identity as a Canadian Anglican. Eventually Mortimer uncovers the Star Maker’s horrific secret to making blockbuster movies.

Mordecai Richer was born in 1931 in Montreal, Canada. After working for the Canadian Broadcasting Service in the 1950s, he moved to London where he wrote seven of his novels, including Cocksure. Returning to Montreal in 1972, he wrote three more novels, including Barney’s Version, which was adapted into a film in 2010. Richler died in 2001.

Norman Ravvin is a writer, critic, and teacher. His publications include the novels The Girl Who Stole Everything, Café des Westens and Lola by Night. In 2023 he published Who Gets In: An Immigration Story, which blends memoir, history and archival work to tell the story of his grandfather’s efforts to bring his family after him from Poland in the early 1930s. A native of Calgary, he lives in Montreal, where he teaches at Concordia University in the Department of Religions and Cultures.

Books mentioned in this episode

By Mordecai Richler:

• The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz (1959)
• The Incomparable Atuk (1963)
• St. Urbain’s Horseman (1971)
• Barney’s Version (1997)

By others:

• Frankenstein by Mary Shelley (1818)
• The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum (1900)
• Ulysses by James Joyce (1922)
• Finnegans Wake by James Joyce (1939)
• The Day of the Locust by Nathaniel West (1939)
• Under the Volcano by Malcolm Lowry (1947)
• Herzog by Saul Bellow (1964)
• Dora Bruder by Patrick Modiano (1997)
• The Plot Against America by Philip Roth (2004)

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In previous series of Ninety-Nine Novels, we learnt about authors including James Joyce, Thomas Pynchon, Nadine Gordimer, Vladimir Nabokov and Christopher Isherwood, among others. These episodes are available at your favourite place to get podcasts.

If you have enjoyed this episode, why not leave us a review and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Listen to this podcast below or on your audio platform of choice (Apple Podcasts / Spotify/ YouTube), or use the streaming links below.

The theme music for the Ninety-Nine Novels podcast is Anthony Burgess’s Concerto for Flute, Strings and Piano in D Minor, performed by No Dice Collective.

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