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3.36 AVERAGE
3.36 AVERAGE
The Day of the Locust has a few really powerful moments, but as a whole it's underwhelming. West's style is at times too mean and too detached--this is especially a problem because most of the characters are too slimy to connect to. Honestly, even the narration is too mean at times. At least it's short.
The Day of the Locust is a book that has a huge reputation in the "literary world" but is seldom discussed outside of critics and English majors. I had heard the book mentioned so many times by people I admire, Stephen King among them, that I decided to read both this book and his strange novella Miss Lonelyhearts. From reading both it is clear why people either love or hate West. His books are dark, lack straight forward plots, and are filled with a very stylistic prose. West is a brilliant writer, that's clear whether you like him or not. Other authors are easier to read and much more fun, but there is a certain gravitas to the way West writes that makes his joyless novels impactful. In this book we have a story centered around a group of young people in 1930's Hollywood, each miserable and depraved. The story is thematically about the falsehood of Hollywood and the deceptive nature of the American dream and how people are driven to madness when life doesn't go the way they planned it. It's about Homer Simpson (the namesake for the Simpsons Character, though this Homer is more like Ned Flanders) and how even nice people are corrupted by what West sees as the ills of 1930's society. This is not a book I would necessarily recommend, but I am glad I read it. I'm not exactly sure why I enjoyed it, it's often dull, never fun, but it packs a punch.
lighthearted
slow-paced
dark
funny
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
This is so good. How can someone so depressing and bitter and cynical also be so accurate and precise and so alert to the world and the intricacies of human experience? I’m baffled by it. There are sentences here to treasure and moments of staggering brilliance.
Here is a great American novel on par with Gatsby, I think. I can't believe I haven't come across it before.
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
It's both well written and enjoyable. I'd never heard of this book until it appeared on my recommendations shelf and I've been trying to figure out why, especially as I then found two copies on the shelf at work. Not to mention how very impressive it was.
I guess there's only so much room for American literature from the thirties to have lasting worldwide appeal through to 2012. It was never on any syllabus I ever read that's for sure. Perhaps it should be. Depression era Hollywood certainly seems less horrifying and, well, depressing than other books about the same time in other parts of America.
That's not to say that this wasn't horrifying, because it was. Not least because everything written by Nathanael West in this novel could quite easily be written about the 21st century and especially that awful area of the world known as Hollywood.
The sense of foreboding or dread that you feel from the start of the novel may not be on a similar plane to [b:The Talented Mr. Ripley|156024|The Talented Mr. Ripley (Ripley, #1)|Patricia Highsmith|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1327943279s/156024.jpg|1817520] for example but it's there all the same. The climax on the other hand is much more powerful that almost anything else I've read and really quite unexpected in it's content. Until this point I was merely enjoying it but the effect it has on the overall reaction to the novel is incredible.
One thing I should point out to people reading a back cover blurb and thinking it sounds like a 1930s version of a [a:Bret Easton Ellis|2751|Bret Easton Ellis|http://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1274408405p2/2751.jpg] novel, this is not about the industry or about shallow, rich people, it is so much more than that. It is a novel about the effect of Hollywood and fame on the everyday reality of normal working class people. The quality literary equivalent of watching idiots line up to embarrass themselves on tv auditioning for The X Factor or Big Brother and taken to its logical extreme.
EDIT: I've just had the pleasure of watching John Schlesinger's underseen movie adaptation and a few quibbles aside it is more than a match for West's novel.
I guess there's only so much room for American literature from the thirties to have lasting worldwide appeal through to 2012. It was never on any syllabus I ever read that's for sure. Perhaps it should be. Depression era Hollywood certainly seems less horrifying and, well, depressing than other books about the same time in other parts of America.
That's not to say that this wasn't horrifying, because it was. Not least because everything written by Nathanael West in this novel could quite easily be written about the 21st century and especially that awful area of the world known as Hollywood.
The sense of foreboding or dread that you feel from the start of the novel may not be on a similar plane to [b:The Talented Mr. Ripley|156024|The Talented Mr. Ripley (Ripley, #1)|Patricia Highsmith|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1327943279s/156024.jpg|1817520] for example but it's there all the same. The climax on the other hand is much more powerful that almost anything else I've read and really quite unexpected in it's content. Until this point I was merely enjoying it but the effect it has on the overall reaction to the novel is incredible.
One thing I should point out to people reading a back cover blurb and thinking it sounds like a 1930s version of a [a:Bret Easton Ellis|2751|Bret Easton Ellis|http://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1274408405p2/2751.jpg] novel, this is not about the industry or about shallow, rich people, it is so much more than that. It is a novel about the effect of Hollywood and fame on the everyday reality of normal working class people. The quality literary equivalent of watching idiots line up to embarrass themselves on tv auditioning for The X Factor or Big Brother and taken to its logical extreme.
EDIT: I've just had the pleasure of watching John Schlesinger's underseen movie adaptation and a few quibbles aside it is more than a match for West's novel.
"Where else could they go but California, the land of sunshine and oranges?
Once there, they discover that sunshine isn’t enough.
They realize that they’ve been tricked and burn with resentment. Every day of their lives they read newspapers and went to the movies. Both fed them on lynchings, murder, sex crimes, explosions, wrecks, love nests, fires, miracles, revolutions, wars. The daily diet made sophisticates of them. The sun is a joke. Oranges can’t titillate their jaded palates. Nothing can ever be violent enough to make taut their slack minds and bodies. They have been cheated and betrayed. They have slaved and saved for nothing."
Empty and crumbling sets, weird architecture, starlets thirsting to be famous, religious fanatics, tired and sick artists, cockfighting, illusioned people, restless crowds, celebrity obsession, fake horses at the bottom of pools. Everything that made/makes Los Angeles so wonderfully bizarre or a dumpster fire, depending on your point of view. West's disjointed execution wasn't the best, but I keep coming to it, so there must be something there.
The movie is equally fascinating, perfectly capturing the grotesqueness and gloominess, and the final frenzied scene is incredible.
adventurous
dark
funny
sad
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated