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Ignatius J. Reilly.

Statue of Ignatius J. Reilly

Field review by the editors.

New Orleans, Louisiana

Ignatius J. Reilly is the unlikely protagonist of the comic novel A Confederacy of Dunces, which is set in New Orleans and written by New Orleans' college professor John Kennedy Toole, who tried for years, unsuccessfully, to convince someone to publish it. Eleven years after Toole killed himself in frustration, his book was finally published, and a plaque next to the statue notes that it won the 1981 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.

Ignatius J. Reilly.

The bronze statue, unveiled in 1996, depicts Reilly as he appears on the opening page of the book: a sloppy, crazed-looking misanthrope with a shopping bag, standing outside the D.H. Holmes department store (now the Hyatt French Quarter Hotel), "studying the crowd of people for signs of bad taste in dress."

Also see: Quirky Monuments of New Orleans

Statue of Ignatius J. Reilly

Chateau Bourbon Hotel

Address:
Canal St., New Orleans, LA
Directions:
On the sidewalk entrance to Chateau Bourbon Hotel (former site of D.H. Holmes Dept. Store from the book), on the northeast side of Canal St. between Dauphine and Bourbon Sts.
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In the region:
Museum of the American Cocktail, New Orleans, LA - 1 mi.

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