"Around the World With Auntie Mame" 1958 Dennis, Patrick

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DENNIS, Patrick

[286] pp.

Harcourt, Brace and Company

1958

8 1/4" x 5 3/4"

Narrator "Patrick" is seventeen, and has … Read more DENNIS, Patrick

[286] pp.

Harcourt, Brace and Company

1958

8 1/4" x 5 3/4"

Narrator "Patrick" is seventeen, and has left his private prep school. His Auntie Mame takes him with her on an extended tour of Europe, which becomes a round-the-world tour before his enrollment in college. They have adventures in Paris, London, Biarritz, Venice, Austria, Russia, Lebanon, and the high seas, meeting and dealing with British nobles, con men, embarrassing relatives, Nazis, and gunrunners before they arrive home again. Much of the action is a slyly satirical commentary on such things as the practice of "presenting at Court," fashionable political activism, the naivete of some Americans abroad, and the ways in which small communities of expatriates often end up behaving.

The main story is encased in a "frame" narrative, in which Patrick, now grown and married, tries to placate his wife with highly edited tales from his travels with his aunt. This takes up where the original novel, Auntie Mame, left off, with Patrick's son Michael going off to India with Mame promising to have him home by Labor Day. Two years have passed, with no word beyond a few random post cards. Each chapter begins with Patrick's reassuring, off-hand comments about his journeys with Mame, and then continues with him narrating what really happened. See less