I mostly skimmed this book by Thomas Wolfe. I had read a significant portion of it during my teens. If my memory serves me right, I ultimately abandoned it. I felt that an understanding of "Look Homeward, Angel" was essential before delving into "You Can't Go Home Again," which was Wolfe's final work. Well, I read "Look Homeward, Angel" a few years ago. So, you might be wondering what my thoughts are about Thomas Wolfe, the writer, now that I have read most of his other works (except his short stories). Unfortunately for the Wolfe enthusiasts, my opinion aligns with that of Harold Bloom. I once felt uneasy when I came across this view in one of his critical essays. Bloom believed that Wolfe's writing didn't deserve to be called literature. When I first heard this opinion, I considered the fact that Bloom was associated with Yale, while Wolfe was from Harvard. However, after careful thought, I don't think that's the main reason. Instead, like Harold Bloom, I think Wolfe's novels aren't literature. It's not because his works are overly written or that he repeated the same style. Many writers have similar flaws. But I find Wolfe to be a weak-kneed writer, a 'young man's' author. He used a literary "trick" that was like an appetizer for those in power. They offer books like Wolfe's as a sort of farewell gift to departing soldiers who love the American shores dearly.

Why do I say this? I can only explain that in my life, Thomas Wolfe and Jack Kerouac were the two writers who dominated the literary scene in the small town of New York State where I grew up. They were like ghostly figures that haunted the schools I attended before college. If I had been more familiar with their work during my youth, I might have tried to incorporate them into my life as a replacement for the hippie dream that represented my parents' generation. Reading Wolfe's story of a young writer who was alienated from America, I found that my own quest to rewrite the story of my youth has taken a different turn. Although it wasn't intentional, I discovered that my desire to return to the Manhattan of my parents' youth and, more importantly, my desire to reclaim the city's streets as a member of the financial sector, has led me to a life where I can leisurely write quasi-philosophical reviews of the literary icons of my adolescence and, at the same time, receive a monthly stipend (in the form of disability payments) for doing so. Isn't it ironic?

Incredible writing! It was a very tough read indeed.

At approximately one-third of the way through, I started to lose all interest as Wolfe described two people preparing for the evening before a party. However, I'm glad I trudged through it. The word "trudged" is quite accurate here. There are some really tough spots that seem to go on for 12 or more pages. This is by far the longest it has taken me to read a book in years.

The book is character-driven with very little plot. With such minimal action, any moments involving action or plot development seem significantly more interesting. His ability to write from different perspectives and describe characters is truly prolific. And then there are the deep thoughts of life and America that he ties in. There are high points in the book, such as reading about George's journey through the responses to his book from his hometown, and near the end of the book when he is traveling in Germany on his way back home. But then there are parts like the end, where George is writing to his editor. There is such deep expression and emotion, yet the length of it made my skin crawl.

Like his other books, be prepared for a long one. Don't be shocked if you have to set it down for a while. It's very good. It's also very long, but still very good.

"Does one ever really learn from others till one is ready for the lesson?"

This is a profound question that the book seems to explore. I truly adored this book. It undeniably made me engage in deep thought.

At certain junctures, the level of details and description was almost overwhelming. However, in other parts, that very detailed description was exquisitely beautiful and rich, making one reluctant for it to conclude.

I regarded this as George's journey, and his appreciations of it were remarkably accurate and relatable. The characters he encountered along the way added another layer of depth.

Perhaps the book could have been 200 pages shorter. But if that were the case, it would have forfeited what made it a great work. It's a delicate balance between too much and too little, and this book, despite its flaws, manages to capture something truly special.

Overall, it's a book that will stay with me and continue to make me reflect on the nature of learning and the importance of our life's journeys.

The impression is strange.

The book seems unfinished, unwritten, lacking a leading thought, a core around which everything gathers.

At the same time, the scattered notes lack vividness and rhythm.

It is well written, but too American, in a naive style of "oh my, what a bad person, and you can't tell right away".

And there is no heat accordingly, no clear path, the hero is wide but not dynamic, and he is somewhat inconsistent, uncoordinated and not quite understandable by himself.

It seems that there is nothing more to write about except oneself, and it is not decent to write only about oneself, and the book turns out to be elusive, with good observations, and that's all.

This book leaves a rather mixed impression. On one hand, the writing has its merits, but on the other hand, it has several drawbacks that prevent it from being a truly outstanding work.

Perhaps with some further refinement and improvement, it could reach a higher level.

The book was extremely dense and laborious to read. It presented the same issue that I had encountered with Poe's "Gold Bug" and Mitchell's Gone with the Wind. Namely, they all contain passages that are bigoted due to the era in which they were written. The authors, like most people of that time, had not yet evolved historically to be aware of their bigotry.

I was able to jot down my objections and criticize the work accordingly. I disliked these passages strongly while, at the same time, liking the passages that I valued very much.

As I continued reading, the book became more engaging. By the time I reached the end, I discovered that the book was very valuable in its theme of how mankind, worldwide, can become blind to the truth and hate our fellow human beings. I realized that this is still relevant today, reminding me of the current problems we face with the mistreatment and rejection of refugees. We often look the other way because we feel powerless.

This is what I saw as the value of the book as a classic, which brings me back to the reason I read it - it is a classic, and I was curious to understand why. This same curiosity prompts me to read many classics. After all, we can't have read them all, and there are so many more waiting to be explored.

This is a long, baggy, and curious book. It's not really a novel, nor is it truly a memoir. I can't recall reading another "novel" that feels so much like a retelling of the author's life. This gives it a strange quality of "this is what's happening to the protagonist - no really, it's not me, the author, it's really George Webber, who just happens to be a writer", even though the plot follows the lines of the author's life. The result is that the book often comes across as defensive, like an apology for the more controversial aspects of Wolfe's life - especially the harsh negative reaction among the people of his hometown to the publication of his first "autobiographical novel" - Look Homeward, Angel.

The better part of the book is the second half, where Wolfe mostly leaves behind that episode and focuses on his time in Brooklyn and visiting Europe. He chronicles the chaos and emerging evil of the Nazi regime. But by the end of the book, there's far too much material dedicated to his professional split with his editor, Maxwell Perkins.

In the author's defense, this "novel" was published posthumously. Editor Edward Aswell of Harper Brothers carved this and another book out of the enormous amount of unpublished material left at the author's early death. So perhaps it would have been structured much differently had it been published during his lifetime.

However, the book also hasn't aged well when measured by its depiction of black people, women, and other minorities. The outdated and perhaps even offensive portrayals in this regard can be a significant drawback for modern readers. It's a reminder that literature, like society, evolves, and some works that were once lauded may now seem to have certain shortcomings in terms of their treatment of diverse groups.

Overall, while the book has its interesting aspects and provides some insights into Wolfe's life and the times he lived in, it also has its flaws that cannot be ignored.

I did not complete this book, as I have only read 70% of it. It was well-written, but it was just too heavy for me. There was an excessive amount of detail, like too much flour in the gravy. It reminded me of Dostoevsky. The book went on numerous rambles about ideas and characters, and I simply got lost and disinterested. I thought about giving up earlier, but then I decided to persevere and find a gem. This happened repeatedly. I think the author needed a good editor to help condense the information. However, maybe that's just the mindset of someone who is used to more concise information rather than expansion.

My favorite author, Karl Ove Knausgård, also goes on tangents and rambles, but I find his work intriguing and interesting.

This book is a social commentary that takes place right before and after the Great Depression. Income inequality, corruption, and worker suppression were rampant. The author, being from the South, calls out the racist culture that thrived on the exploitation of minorities.

It's astonishing that these thoughts were being expressed nearly 90 years ago, and yet we still seem to be in the same situation. The following is a long excerpt from the book that is just as relevant today, which makes me think that we haven't changed or learned much.

But it wasn't just in the South that America was hurting. There was another, deeper, darker, and more nameless wound throughout the land. What could it be? Was it in the record of corrupt officials and polluted governments, administrations twisted to the core, the huge excess of privilege and graft, protected criminals and gangster rule, the democratic forms all rotten and putrescent with disease? Was it in "puritanism," that great, vague name? Whatever it was, it was in all of these things, and in the daily toll of murdered men, the lurid renderings of...

However, we mustn't just look at these outward forms to find evidence of a nation's hurt. We must also look at the heart of guilt that beats within each of us, for that's where the cause lies. We must look and see with our own eyes the central core of defeat, shame, and failure that we have inflicted on the lives of even the least of our brothers. We must probe to the bottom of our collective wound. As men and as Americans, we can no longer cower and lie. Are we not all warmed by the same sun?.... Yes, and if we don't look and see it, we shall all be damned together.

This book contains many such instances of thought-provoking prose. Since I didn't finish the book, I'm not sure how it ends. But I know that the story of America's deep wounds has not ended.

Faulkner lauded Wolfe as the best of their generation, dubbing him "the finest failure."

This accolade is not without merit. What I admire most about Wolfe's writing is its vast scope. At times, it appears as if he was attempting to encapsulate all of America within a single novel. Although he may not have achieved this feat entirely, he came incredibly close.

At his core, Wolfe was a hopeful individual. He had faith in the possibility of religious transcendence and firmly believed in America and its boundless possibilities. These twofold optimisms, in my opinion, lie at the heart of the most outstanding moments in this novel.

Moreover, as an added bonus, he provides numerous valuable nuggets of wisdom for aspiring writers.

He once said, "It all boiled down to this: honesty, sincerity, no compromise with truth - those were the elements of any art - and a writer, no matter what else he had, was just a hack without them."

This profound statement serves as a reminder to all writers that integrity and a commitment to truth are essential ingredients for creating great art.

The paperback version of this novel consists of 711 pages. It is a captivating saga centered around George Webber, who serves as a prototype for the author, Thomas Wolfe.

The novel unfolds at least three distinct levels. Firstly, it delves into George Webber's arduous struggle to pen novels and earn the acceptance of his fellow novelists and publishers. Secondly, it vividly描绘s America's transformation from the exuberant go-go 20's to the economic turmoil and depression of the 1930's. Thirdly, it showcases how Webber endeavors to find salvation by embarking on a voyage to England and Germany in the mid-1930's, just a few years prior to the outbreak of World War II.

Wolfe possesses an unrivaled talent for "theatrically" presenting unforgivable scenes. The opening of the book offers a detailed description of the tenements in New York and Webber's iconoclastic Japanese neighbor. As Webber boards the train to leave New York, the narrative transports the reader to the hometown denizens on the train during his temporary return home. A hundred pages further on, Weber attends a party on the Upper East Side on the evening of October 29, 1929. The decadence and greed exhibited by the people at the party stand in stark contrast to the plight of those in Brooklyn who are literally starving just a few short years later.

Regrettably, there is insufficient space to fully extol the virtues of this remarkable novel. Reading this book demands time and patience. Nevertheless, the reader will be handsomely rewarded with the experience of engaging with a truly great American novel.

This captivating novel chronicles the life of a writer who endures the stock market crash of 1929 and the subsequent years leading up to the outbreak of WWII.

The book is divided into several distinct sections, each offering a unique perspective. I find myself particularly drawn to a section that vividly描绘s a glamorous party in New York, with characters interacting in a myriad of ways from various angles.

However, other sections contain essays that seem somewhat detached from the main plotline. This is likely due to the fact that the book was published posthumously and assembled from manuscripts by an editor.

Here are some quotations from the novel that provide a tantalizing glimpse into the author's writing style: https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes... Overall, this novel offers a rich and complex exploration of a tumultuous period in history, through the eyes of a talented writer.

The political climate of the era, the developments and characters under the name of progress... When looking back, it is obvious that many things in the nest have not changed. However, due to today's dynamics, it can be said that there is no longer any interval for not returning to any nest.

The novel succeeds in very beautifully conveying what is intended to be conveyed from the beginning, but in the later sections, it almost disappears in the superficiality of character beautifications. While waiting for the excitement created in the first section to deepen, we are spending time with a number of beautiful events, people, and unnecessary details. Who knows, perhaps because of this percentage, it is quite easy to find the quality parts among them. Nevertheless, it may be necessary to read with patience.

"What is the truth? The truth has thousands of faces. Show one of them and then all the remaining faces disappear. Invisible. That's the problem. The whole truth can be shown. Just discovery is not enough to bring the truth to light. It is also necessary to know where the found thing came from. Where did the stones used in the construction of this whole building come from?... You see a wall and if you look at the wall carefully for a long time, one day you will see that this wall is all the walls that exist for you."

I'd completely forgotten about this incident until it surfaced during the quiz.

In my senior year of high school, I took a comprehensive literature class. As part of the course, we were required to write a major paper on a single book, and I chose this one.

My paper delved into the theme of interlocking webs, which I believe consisted of three layers: himself, his community, and the country. I'll have to review it again to be certain.

I truly adored this book. I relished its complexity and felt a deep resonance with it because going home was precisely what I had planned to do after high school - leaving the East Coast to return to the University of Michigan.

Since then, I've experienced a back-and-forth. On one hand, "It Was True!" The place I returned to was entirely different, and so was I. But on the other hand, "I WON!" because some things remained the same - the seasons, the value systems (on a good day), the occasional smell of a certain summer day, the blondeness (very much not in New Haven), the tallness, my entire history here, the River, the proximity to Chicago, the wastelandness (according to the rest of the country), and the lack of fetish over current clothing styles (especially in the winter).

So, I've been deeply engaged with this book, but now it's a distant memory. I must re-read it! Perhaps closer to the end of my daughter's senior year of high school, then I can shed a lot of tears too, overwhelmed by the poignancy of it all (past and present). I really need a Date-to-Read field now!

P.S. I received a relatively poor grade on the paper, like a 'D' or an 'F'. Basically, my teacher didn't understand at all. What I had created was something far more complex than the assignment. It could have gone off on excessive tangents and been self-indulgent, but I knew we were on completely different wavelengths, and I still got what I wanted out of the experience.