The Heart is a Lonely Hunter (1940) by Carson McCullers

Carson McCullers debut novel The Heart is a Lonely Hunter was written in 1940 when she was only 23-years old.  It was an immediate bestseller and routinely ranks as one of the top 100 English-language novels of the century.  It is set-in small-town Georgia in the “recovery” years after the Great Depression. It was explosively controversial when published and remains so today because of the issues raised in the book: the spread of communism, rising fascism in Europe, and income inequality and racism in America.

The main character in the book is a deaf mute named John Singer.  He carries a card he presents to people when he meets them explaining that he is deaf, but an expert lip reader, he will write out sentences when necessary.  It is to him that the other primary characters reveal themselves, routinely telling him everything that is on their minds, believing he understands and agrees with them because he rarely lets them know otherwise. They are: a girl going through adolescence, he lives at the bordering house run by her parents; the widowed owner of a café where much of the action takes place; a labor-organizer/budding communist, who works as a carnival barker and is an alcoholic; and an African American medical doctor.  Singer’s story is never clear even though his attachment to another deaf mute, Spiros, who has been forcibly committed to a mental institution by an Uncle, plays a major role in the novel.

   

Many reviewers of the book have zeroed in on “love” as being what motivates each of the characters. I don’t, at least not in the sense of a lonely hearts club romance.  Longing is a factor, but it is not necessarily a physical love.  Mick, the young girl, for instance longs for an escape from the town, a career as a composer – she is devastated when she must take a job at Woolworth's when she is just 16 to help her family.  She realizes the decision will likely end her education, end her ambitions.             

“Mick frowned and rubbed her fist hard across her forehead.  That was the way things were.  It was like she was mad all the time.  Not how a kid gets mad quick so that soon it is all over – but in another way.  Only there was nothing to be mad at.  Unless the store.  But the store hadn’t asked her to take the job.  So there was nothing to be mad at.  It was like she was cheated.  Only nobody had cheated her.  So there, just the same she had that feeling.  Cheated.”

The doctor, old and in poor health himself, encompasses the longing in the book most clearly.  He has struggled and longed to see his family, and his people, rise up and prosper, only to see them beat down by the South, and then beaten down further by their acceptance of those circumstances. He oddly shares the political philosophy of the labor organizer (and in fact even named one of his sons after Karl Marx).  He puzzles over his friendship with Singer, the only white man he feels understands him.

Near the end of the book, Singer will commit suicide.  He does so when he learns that his friend who was forcibly institutionalized has died. Spiros, a troubled young man on multiple fronts, as a fellow deaf mute, was the only one who Singer thought knew him.  He was to Singer, what Singer was to the other characters in the book.  This comes strikingly clear shortly after Singer learns of Spiros’ death.  He is passing a tavern/restaurant when he realizes there is a table of three deaf men signing away inside, he stops and joins them briefly, though doesn't feel welcome.  He departs to catch his train. Singer’s lonely heart is the lack of a community that understands his reality.

Recommendation:  Yes, and no.  This is not an easy read, if you are looking for pleasure reading, this is not it.  If you are looking for biting, often painful social criticism, this is a masterpiece.  The 1968 movie of the novel is, in a word, awful.

There There (2018) By Tommy Orange

Over the past few years, I’ve read and reviewed several books from the Native (American) Literature genre.  Almost exclusively, these titles have dealt with “Rez Life” -- the impact of growing up and living, permanently or seasonally, on a reservation.  Last year however author Tommy Orange added a new and often ignored topic to this literally canon with his book There There set in an urban “ghetto” in Oakland, California. 

Oakland, like most North American cities, has neighborhoods that are often the “first stop” when a Native individual or family arrives in town from a reservation. These neighborhoods, like first generation immigrant communities, are generally low-income neighborhoods where people learn about their new environments, and get their first jobs, all the while being able to connect with people who understand and respect the culture they are coming from.  The existence of these neighborhoods is part of a familiar, even predictable, pattern of urban settlement.  

   

When I began the book, I immediately guessed wrong. It is structured as a collection of intermingled short stories, each about a particular character.  After story #2 about a young man’s grant project, I thought I had the book figured out.  His idea was to produce a video of Native (full-blooded, or not) residents of Oakland, letting them talk on camera, without a script, of their life experiences -- much of the taping would take place at Oakland’s Pow Wow.  Because of this, I jumped to the conclusion that the book was a written version of the project. And, in a way it is.  There There could easily stand on its own as a sociology research study, the material is there, it’s a key part of the character development of the story.  And, it reads sort of slow at first, the way a study would.  And if it stopped there that would be fine, it’d still be a good book.

What is a Pow Wow?

But, as I eventually discovered, the book isn’t a textbook, it is essentially an action-thriller, masked as a sociological survey.  It seems the people whose lives we get to witness are often tangentially connected, and in many cases actually related. Their stories will come together at the Pow Wow.   Despite being a first-time novelist, Orange expertly takes us to the climax.  At about three quarters of the way through the book, the chapters start to get progressively shorter, with no digressions, yet lots of detail.  Reading speed picks up dramatically, and you are there, in person, holding your breath. And that, without a spoiler, is all I’m giving you. 

Recommendation:  Yes.

Clock Without Hands (1961) By Carson McCullers

I am finding retirement to be a time for tackling authors I always meant to read, but never could find the time to do so. One of those authors is Carson McCullers.  Her classic The Heart is a Lonely Hunter has been on my reading list for a long time.  I’ve just started reading the Library of America collection of her Complete Novels.

I did not begin with Lonely Hunter however, I picked her last novel instead, Clock Without Hands, published in 1961.  It is a “Southern Gothic” text set in the town of Milan, Georgia. The selection was made because of its relevance to current (2019) political events.  Clock Without Hands has four main characters, one of whom is a proud segregationist former Congressman.  The former Congressman is called “Judge” by everyone, as a title of respect.  He’s routinely referred to as one of the South’s “leading citizens.” 

The plot revolves around the differing world views of the Judge, his grandson Jester, and a young African American, Sherman Pew – so named because he was abandoned at birth, left in a church pew.  Today we look at this debate and wonder how the Judge’s “old South” world view was ever tolerated, rather on accepted as politically tenable in the halls of Congress, and we question the excuse of “that’s the way it was back then.”

The book’s end coincides with the Supreme Court decision ordering the integration of public schools, a KKK meeting convened by the Judge & the local Sheriff, and a bombing.

The fourth main character in the book is the town pharmacist, J.T. Malone.  While he is involved in the main plot, his subplot (inserted for symbolism) is heart wrenching, in Chapter 1 he is diagnosed with leukemia.  He dies in the book's final paragraph.

McCullers’ writing is incredible, flawless. Her status as a cutting-edge author is secured by a pantheon of stories with plots and characters that remain controversial today, and were definitely taboo in the 50’s and into the 60’s.  Her depiction of the small-town South of that era is frightening, and I dare say on target.

My only prior exposure to McCullers is the movie adaptation of Reflections in a Golden Eye, starring Marlon Brando and Elizabeth Taylor.  I will definitely read it, as well as the other seven novels in the collection. 

In her personal life, McCullers was friends with Tennessee Williams, another author identified with the South.  I did not know that until reading the Wikipedia post on her when I finished Clock Without Hands.  That friendship is apparent however because as I was reading the book, the similarities between the Judge, and “Big Daddy,” a character in Williams’ classic Cat on a Hot Tin Roof had occurred to me – not as a plagiarism issue, but one of character construction in Southern literature. 

Recommendation:  Yes, absolutely.

The Spy: A Tale of the Neutral Ground (written 1821) By James Fenimore Cooper

In the early decades of the United States, book publishing was by no means a path to sudden fame or fortune, yet James Fenimore Cooper’s historical fiction The Spy was a commercial success.  While Cooper is best known to future generations as the author of the “Leatherstocking” series  (The: Deerslayer, Pathfinder, Last of the Mohicans, Pioneers, and Prairie), he was known in his time for his works set in the American Revolution.  The Library of America has gathered two of those works in a new publication, copyrighted earlier this year, pairing The Spy with Lionel Lincoln.

The Spy is cast in what is now Westchester County, north of New York City.  It was rural and sparsely settled at the time of the Revolution.  It was also “neutral ground,” its residents’ positions on the war varied, some loyal to the King, while others favored the newly declared independent States, former colonies.  Caught between the British stronghold of New York, and the American stronghold in the interior of the country, this neutrality was also a necessity.  Located in this no-man’s land is The Locusts, the country farm of the Wharton family, itself with divided loyalties, whom are attempting to ride out the storm of war.  Their attempt is far from successful with Henry, the son of the clan, serving as an officer in the King’s service, while his sister is a strong advocate of the new country and is in love with a Major on the American side of the fighting. Complicating life for all, were the Skinners, a rogue element of bandits who victimized residents of the neutral ground, they operated with allegiance to either the Americans or the British, as circumstances warranted.

Readers are able to determine who the title character is fairly early in the book, he is a neighbor of the Wharton’s, a peddler who travels between American and British lines selling his wares.  He is thought by many to be a spy for the English and is captured by the Americans and sentenced to death twice, strangely escaping both occasions.  It is only late in the book that readers are able to determine his exact loyalties.  Spoiler alert: he is in the service of General George Washington.  The story told here is thought to be a true story, that such a spy did exist.  Cooper’s work of historical fiction has kept that story alive.

Lionel Lincoln will be a future read.

Recommendation:  Yes, for both students of American history, and of American literature.