The Adventures of Augie March (Classic, 20th-Century, Penguin) | Saul Bellow

The Adventures of Augie March (Classic, 20th-Century, Penguin) | Saul Bellow | Augie March

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	The Adventures of Augie March (Classic, 20th-Century, Penguin) Saul Bellow Penguin Classics, 1996 - 544 pages average customer review:based on 65 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Ranging from the depths of poverty to the heights of success, this is the chronicle of a modern-day Columbus in search of reality and fulfilment.

Well deserving Great American Tale [81][T]

At this point in my life, I believe that American literature peaks when the topic is relatively simple: describe a rags to riches odyssey by a young person whose urban environment's school of hard knocks leads him or her to great fortune - monetary or otherwise. Among those great novels, I would have to include "The Adventures of Augie March."

The incredibly well written and thoroughly descriptive narrative covering the life of boy Augie to his expatriate life amid the city of lights, Bellow proves his achievement awards for his literature is both deserving and inevitable.

This book, centering upon Chicago, makes me think the author is like another Chicago-themed author of American literature: Theodore Dreiser. Augie is not much different than the great protagonist Carrie Meeber of Sister Carrie. Like Sister Carrie , this is a tome. Well over 250,000 words, this book can be a great read, but it will require some significant time by the bed stand. Both Carrie and Augie fall upon success. Neither seeks it, it falls upon them. And, each is very humble upon the receipt. And, those around them are envious and admiring.

The importance of education then, and even more true today, is outlined in one discourse. "You should go out and find what you can do, and then after four years if you aren't any good at any special thing, you at least have this degree. And it won't be any sonofabitch who can kick you around." Good advice. Then. And, today.

But, going to school would not make a great storyline. So, we follow Augie who washes dogs, aids a pool hall owner, helps his brother in the in-law's business, trains eagles in Mexico, works with intellectuals in writing books, and eventually works on deals in France.. A war stint here, a time on the open sea there, and a few other diversions, not forgetting the women he wooed - as well as those who wooed him - make this an incredibly entertaining tale. And, we are truly glad that his wishes had not become true when he states, "Sometimes I wished I could become a shoemaker too."

Great writing mixed with a great tale make this a great novel.

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Augie March

"I am an American, Chicago-born, that somber city ...and go at things as I have taught myself, freestyle, and will make the record in my own way: first to knock, first admitted, sometimes an innocent knock, sometimes a not so innocent. But a man's character is his fate, says Heraclitus, and in the end there isn't any way to disguise the nature of the knocks by accoustical work on the door or gloving the knuckles."

This, the opening paragraph of Bellow's large, sprawling, and exuberant novel, "The Adventures of Augie March" (1953) announces its themes at the outset. We have the narrator's, Augie March's, own voice, both pugnacious and reflective. First and foremost, Augie March is "an American". His story will be a reflection on the American experience, especially as it involves large cities and the Chigago where Augie March grew up. Augie, looking ahead to the story he is about to tell, describes himself as free-wheeling, and learning about things as his life impulsively proceeds. Augie is also a lover of books and learning, as witnessed by his allusion to the Pre-Socratic Greek philosopher, Heraclitus who taught that "a man's character is his fate." Augie will learn and expand upon this lesson as he goes along and also will learn about many other books and ideas.

Augie's story is centered in Chicago. It begins just before the Depression, when Augie is a young boy and continues through WW II and its aftermath in the 1940's when Augie is married and living as a black marketeer in Paris, wondering where life will take him next. In between, Augie tells a long yarn full of adventure, turns and twists, difficulties, and women. Augie is also a highly reflective individual, and the boisterousness of his story is accompanied by thoughts on the course of his life and its significance.

Augie has two brothers, the ambitious and successful older brother Simon and the feeble-minded George. Augie's father abandoned the family at an early age. Augie and his brothers are raised by "Grandma Lausch" who in fact is unrelated to him and by his quiet and unassuming mother. Simon is intelligent and alive to the main chance. He graduates first in his high school, marries well, and becomes a highly successful entrepreneur.

Augie's life takes a different course and is harder to define. He partly goes where life takes him and he partly makes his own opportunities. As an adolescent he becomes involved with an entreprenurial swindler named Einhorn who becomes the first of Augie's many protectors. He takes up with a rich family in Evanston, Ill, who offer him security and who wish to adopt him. But Augie goes his own way. He has many jobs, some honest, some not, reads voraciously even though he never graduates from college, has numerous love affairs, serious, and casual, and somehow works himself through a life of ups and downs. He becomes a labor organizer, travels to Mexico training an eagle with an eccentric woman whom he loves, enlists in the Merchant Marine, where he spends days on the open sea with a crazy mate before he is rescued, and ultimately marries Stella, an actress and one of the many women from his past. With his marriage to Stella, Augie finds he learns the meaning of love, for all his shortcomings and those of his wife.

Augie learns to see himself as an individual, neither determined by his circumstances nor fully independent of them. He becomes a life-long thinker who learns from books as well as from his own experience. He tries to learn to shape himself, to the extent he can, and to take his experiences and be happy. His story is a massive commentary on being an American and on the meaning of Heraclitus's dictum that "character is fate", the themes announced as the book begins. The book rejects the themes of alienation and of being an outsider that were and remain a feature of American intellectual life and that were prominent in Bellow's first novel, "Dangling Man." Alienation gives way to activity, a commitment to the promise and value of American life, and a sense that literature, philosophy, and learning can help to better the human condition.

"The Adventures of Augie March" was the first of three of Bellow's novels that received the National Book Award. It is a rewarding but difficult read that pulls in many directions, steet-wise tough and intellectually demanding, simultaneously. Bellow captures the voice of the streets of Jewish Chicago, with long, involuted sentences, passion, humor, and swagger. The book is long and diffuse and at times it flags. In its robust and energetic portrayal of a person, a city, and a nation, and in its devotion to literature and thought, "Augie March" remains an inspiring story.

Robin Friedman

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Found a favorite

I have definitely found a new favorite in Auggie March. Definitely a slow read, but the episodes of thought and emotion were definitely worth the work. Maybe I am biased though as the more and more I read this book the more I realized I had some things in common with Senor March, in thought and experience. It was rather odd, even one of the character names was right on to my experiences. Freaked me out a little. All in all I thought it was an amazing read, but I definitely would not recommend this book to everyone.

Review of Penguin Classics' Augie March

Honestly, I, like many readers, found this book at times quite tedious. Bellow creates a world with many, many characters, each with their own unique characteristics and outlooks. This is a work which requires concentration and dedication to the story, which some readers may be unwilling to give.

The work is soaked in references to classical literature, especially Greek and Roman literature, which I found very entertaining, being very interested in classics.

After nearly six-hundred pages, one does develop a deep, psychological understanding of the character, and begins to develop opinions about his fate. The story is in this sense engrossing.

The introduction is excellent. Mr. Hitchens is brief and lucid.

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Is Bellow The Real Salinger?

This coming of age book, is for me, what I had hoped for when I read Catcher in the Rye. Some might think of the two writers as apples and oranges, but I couldn't help but to compare the two books as I read. Augie is a character that is made real by his creator. There is nothing at all contrived, self important or intentionally rebellious and yet Augie is a rebel of the highest order, one who is forced to face the real world and chooses his own path.

reviews: page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10

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