Sorting out Bellow

"Dangling Man and The Victim had brought Bellow to the attention of literary circles, but it was Augie March, winner of the National Book Award for 1953, that made his name. By his own account he had a great time writing it, and for the first few hundred pages his creative excitement is infectious. The reader is exhilarated by the daring, high-speed, racy prose, by the casual ease with which one mot juste ("Karas, in a sharkskin, double-breasted suit and presenting a look of difficulties in shaving and combing terrifically outwitted") after another is tossed off. Not since Mark Twain had an American writer handled the demotic with such verve. The book won its readers over with its variety, its restless energy, its impatience with the proprieties"

"Once it becomes clear that its hero is to lead a charmed life, Augie March begins to pay for its lack of dramatic structure and indeed of intellectual organization. The book becomes steadily less engaging as it proceeds. The scene-by-scene method of composition, each scene beginning with a tour de force of vivid word painting, begins to seem mechanical. The many pages devoted to Augie's adventures in Mexico, occupied in a harebrained scheme to train an eagle to catch iguanas, add up to precious little, despite the resources of writing lavished on them. And Augie's principal wartime escapade, torpedoed, trapped with a mad scientist in a lifeboat off the African coast, is simply comic-book stuff."

Here's the link to the full review:

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/17110

Have you read Herzog? The internal monologues and unwritten letters of main character, ol' Mose, can almost be seen as a (self) parody of this over-heated impulse.

I'd like to add the late "novel" Ravelstein to the must-read list. Perhaps because of its autobiographical element it's more immediate w/stronger scenes and dialogue. It's far easier to read than even the earliest stuff that Scott rightly recommeded. Written in his 80s!

"The challenge of modern freedom, or the combination of isolation and freedom which confronts you, is to make yourself up. The danger is you may emerge from the process as a not-entirely human creature."

I've never gotten through Augie March, though, for this reason. You should read Herzog, though.

I can't tell from the little context given - but is the person meant to be surprised? Because "round eyed" doesn't necessarily mean the literal shape of a person's eyes - it can also mean "surprised". So in that case, the "round" part could indicate surprise, and the "somewhat circular" could be a specific description of the shape of the person's eyes.

lengthy & revealing interview w/Janis Bellow on Saul's upcoming Letters

At first glance, I thought that was Paul Daniels.

His novels are so lumpy, right? Rereading Humboldt's Gift, I'm having the same trouble with its anxious plotting and almost flippant way with chronology as I did more than a decade ago.

yup

I've given up on enjoying Augie but feel like I have to finish it anyway

It isn't v good, imo. Some rly great sections, a flabby whole. That whole Updike/Roth/him crowd, I feel obligated to explore them, but they're all no better than intermittently good (or great, in Roth's case, tho that's mostly The Ghost Writer) so far.

i don't agree! i can't read updike though. so i guess i agree with that. bellow and and roth though...they could be way better than intermittently good. they could be better than most. at least in this stupid country.

that's a hell of a backpedal, scott

Really enjoyed the Rabbit books by Updike and the Bech books by Roth. Both series are compulsively readable without any focus on style (to me) - something Augie just isn't. In Augie the baroque is just distracting.

i should really re-read some bellow. haven't read him in years.

augie is definitely overstuffed, but the good stuff is so good.