A Walk on the Wild Side (1956)
Orrinís review of The Man with the Golden Arm has gotten me to ask the question, "Must I agree with the authorís politics to appreciate and value his or her writing?" But then I approach the stairwell of this speculation and find the Brothersjudd founder asleep with a die in his ear and I remember I live down the street in the house with the doors and windows.
So, letís then take another look at Algren and his writing.
First, whether you agree with a damn thing Algren says, you canít help but be blown away by his craft. His writing is a thing of raw, naked power. Having invested nights and nights in the back of a Chicago precinct listening to the patter of lies, confessions and delusions of the usual suspects, Algrenís dialogue is a sweet and exacting science. There is a fight going on and he is the referee, and someone is being bloodied and he is not going to blow the whistle, not going to interfere, and you are waiting and thinking, "break it up ? why wonít you break it up?" And then you look down and find your wallet is gone and youíve been cut ? badly ? and it is your blood on the barroom floor.
Neon Wilderness, his collection of short stories, is a testament to the development of this approach. And whereas Orrinís take on Man with the Golden Arm is that Algren sees his subjects as victims, Wilderness takes on the transition to true observer, unattached to outcomes, and in this way, letís whatever irony or sadness blossom in the cracks of the sidewalk. Whether you choose to trample or pluck it, thatís up to you. Either way, the thing is a liviní, thieviní, blunderiní testament to one of the most gifted and forgotten writers in American History. The man was a hell of good writer.
What also needs to be said is that Algren is not your usual liberal Dreiser intellectual. He did not believe in carousing with other writers, although he did have a long, love letter thing going with the French writer, Simone de Beauvoir ? and she dedicated a book to him. His real love was the poker table and the horse track. And ? it goes without saying ? these were affairs that took more than they gave.
Which leads to the other fact about Nelson Algren. He was a con man. Always in debt, he became a tireless and somewhat dishonest hustler within the publishing circles. Winner of the first National Book Award, Algren was a popular draw on the magazine circuit. However, he became renowned for retreading his works ? for making short stories out of chapters of his novels ? and vice versa. His short story, The Captain has Bad Dreams, became the basis for Man with the Golden Arm. The final scene of A Walk on the Wild Side is a remake of his short, The Face on the Barroom Floor. And so on. Which I find amusing and admirable. He eventually ended up in a little shack down on the Lake Michigan shore.
As for me, I first looked into Algren in í89 having found mention of him in my favorite cult book, Troutfishing in America. In it, Richard Brautigan proposes that he and his friends pack an old legless wino named Troutfishing in America Shorty in a crate and ship him to Nelson Algren in Chicago.
For me, the issue with Nelson Algren is not his politics, but the politics of a literary establishment that has chosen to desert him. I was a literature major at Colgate and my professors didnít mentioned Algren. Maybe he pissed them off. Maybe his choice to not suck publishing house ----- made him an undesirable. Most likely, it was Algrenís subject matter that made them uncomfortable. Thatís hard to believe unless theyíre really a bunch of fat, yapping phonies.
Letís check it off as another reason to tra-la-la into Lawrence Hall with a six of Mickyís and a bullwhip.
See Orrin's review
of The Man with The Golden Arm
(Reviewed:)
Grade: (A)
