Humboldt's Gift by Saul Bellow
Title: Humboldt's Gift
Author: Saul Bellow
Published: 1975
Number of pages: 487
Blurb: For many years, the great poet Von Humboldt Fleisher and Charlie Citrine, a young man inflamed with a love for literature, were the best of friends. At the time of his death, however, Humboldt is a failure, and Charlie's life has reached a low point: his career is at a standstill, and he's enmeshed in an acrimonious divorce, infatuated with a highly unsuitable young woman, and involved with a neurotic Mafioso. But then Humboldt acts from beyond the grave, bestowing upon Charlie an unexpected legacy that may just help him turn his life around.
This novel won a Pulitzer Prize in 1976 and apparently was a key cause of Saul Bellow winning the Nobel Prize for Literature in the same year. I have to say that I didn't really enjoy it very much. I've contemplated the matter and decided that's this is because I was completely indifferent to the two main characters. Apparently the book is based on Bellow's relationship with a poet, Delmore Schwartz (who I've never heard of), which makes Bellow Charlie Citrine and Schwartz, Humboldt. Neither character has much in the way of redeeming features. Humboldt is insane and beating his wife before we're 150 pages into the novel. He is paranoid and manipulative of Charlie. Charlie meanwhile is basically an idiot, an excellent example of this being when he gives Humboldt (who he knows to be completely off his rocker) a blank cheque in a sort of blood brothers pact - whhhhyyy? He must know that there is no way that this could end well; you don't just go around giving random friends carte blanche to remove money from your bank account. Meanwhile he complains and complains about issues which quite frankly seem to be of his own making. His ex-wife wants all his money but he ran off with a much younger woman - no wonder she's annoyed. He claims not to have any money due to the divorce and yet he stays in the Ritz Hotel etc. etc. etc. He seems to have had a pretty nice life and yet be squandering it away, something that doesn't really endear me to a character.
Overall, I think that one of the main problems I had with this book is that it has become a bit dated. It was written in 1975 and I think that both the style and the content are a very clear reflection of that era. Bellow certainly does have a way with words however he tends towards the verbose. At the bottom of it all, the story itself is quite interesting but he layers that with pages and pages of philosophical musings, which are quite tiring to wade through.
And this was only the second of eight Bellow books on the 1001 list… as a Nobel Prize winner, maybe you should read one of his books before you die, but having read Humboldt's Gift, I think eight is asking rather a lot!
Author: Saul Bellow
Published: 1975
Number of pages: 487
Blurb: For many years, the great poet Von Humboldt Fleisher and Charlie Citrine, a young man inflamed with a love for literature, were the best of friends. At the time of his death, however, Humboldt is a failure, and Charlie's life has reached a low point: his career is at a standstill, and he's enmeshed in an acrimonious divorce, infatuated with a highly unsuitable young woman, and involved with a neurotic Mafioso. But then Humboldt acts from beyond the grave, bestowing upon Charlie an unexpected legacy that may just help him turn his life around.
This novel won a Pulitzer Prize in 1976 and apparently was a key cause of Saul Bellow winning the Nobel Prize for Literature in the same year. I have to say that I didn't really enjoy it very much. I've contemplated the matter and decided that's this is because I was completely indifferent to the two main characters. Apparently the book is based on Bellow's relationship with a poet, Delmore Schwartz (who I've never heard of), which makes Bellow Charlie Citrine and Schwartz, Humboldt. Neither character has much in the way of redeeming features. Humboldt is insane and beating his wife before we're 150 pages into the novel. He is paranoid and manipulative of Charlie. Charlie meanwhile is basically an idiot, an excellent example of this being when he gives Humboldt (who he knows to be completely off his rocker) a blank cheque in a sort of blood brothers pact - whhhhyyy? He must know that there is no way that this could end well; you don't just go around giving random friends carte blanche to remove money from your bank account. Meanwhile he complains and complains about issues which quite frankly seem to be of his own making. His ex-wife wants all his money but he ran off with a much younger woman - no wonder she's annoyed. He claims not to have any money due to the divorce and yet he stays in the Ritz Hotel etc. etc. etc. He seems to have had a pretty nice life and yet be squandering it away, something that doesn't really endear me to a character.
Overall, I think that one of the main problems I had with this book is that it has become a bit dated. It was written in 1975 and I think that both the style and the content are a very clear reflection of that era. Bellow certainly does have a way with words however he tends towards the verbose. At the bottom of it all, the story itself is quite interesting but he layers that with pages and pages of philosophical musings, which are quite tiring to wade through.
And this was only the second of eight Bellow books on the 1001 list… as a Nobel Prize winner, maybe you should read one of his books before you die, but having read Humboldt's Gift, I think eight is asking rather a lot!