The Day of Locust

Yes, as Sunset Boulvevard is the GREAT Hollywood MOVIE, The Day of the Locust is, indeed, the GREAT Hollywood NOVEL! Most critics fail to make a connection with an artistic movement, Surrealism, which was extant as this novel was being written (published in 1939). But surreal it is, written in a white-hot heat with moments not to be believed (a brutal cockfight, an expiring vaudevillian, a visit to a transgender club, the Battle of Waterloo) until the reader remembers that we are in Hollywood. This is a fine, fine novel! (Note: in about a 24-hour period, American literature lost Fitzgerald to a heart attack and West to a car accident, a week that must have left the California literati in despair!).

Unimpressive.

I have to admit, I skimmed the last 20 pages or so. Not my type of book

1939. I have three copies of this so I guess it was about time I read it. This skewers Hollywood people, providing a wide range of types and showing them to be shallow, avaricious, thrill-seeking and desperate for some kind of sensation, because they are soulless and dead inside. Considered shocking at the time, it shows prostitution, drinking, gambling and strangely (and vividly) cock-fighting. It skirts around the violence of rape, never quite reaching the level of rape, but making it plain that it could happen at any second among people for whom kicks are more necessary than any particular moral stance. It peaks at a preview for a new film where the mob outside goes crazy, in a free-for-all, where women are molested, and people are crushed and injured. Even they characters who are witnessing the spectacle with the greatest amount of detachment and disgust are drawn into the mob mentality at the end and are unable to maintain their self-control. It's a pretty horrible story in some ways, but it also provides the very spectacle it condemns. I was glued to my seat in horrified fascination at the cock-fight, the mob and the near-rape scenes. Watching these people strain to find something to feel, made them remarkably human, and though repulsive not dismissible. As a window into Hollywood of the 30s, a scene on a studio lot, walking through what felt like miles of discarded scenery from every possible kind of movie, was visually stunning. I also like the cowboys who seemed to be trapped between the worlds of the rodeo and the Hollywood image of the cowboy while still being real (brutal) cowboys inside. A dwarf bookie is horribly abused too. Colorful would be one word for it, but grim would be another.

Strange, sad, grotesque.

Boring Hollywood wannabes

I liked this one slightly better than Miss Lonelyhearts and, though some of the themes of loneliness and isolation are similar, it is a very different kind of novella. It's much more about the artifice of Hollywood, of the people that really don't belong and those that strangely do...of the Mexicans and cock fights, of those who don't gain love and the falseness of the girls only looking for a better acting role. These characters are too innocent and human to be depraved but they clearly have some very fatal flaws, all of them. I did like the energy of some scenes and the way West was able to depict the characters in various stages of jealousy, longing, and lust in the Hollywood heat.


*Spoiler*

I think the reason why for me this is a slightly better novella is because of the way it ends..with a misunderstanding that leads to a public fury. At that point, it really doesn't matter if anyone "gets the girl."


pg. 79 "Tod examined him eagerly. He didn't mean to be rude but at first glance this man seemed an exact model for the kind of person who comes to California to die, perfect in every detail down to his fever eyes and unruly hands.

"My name is Homer Simpson," the man gasped...

pg. 103 "Only those who still have hope can benefit from tears. When they finish, they feel better. But to those without hope, like Homer, whose anguish is basic and permanent, no good comes from crying. Nothing changes for them. They usually know this but still can't help crying.

Homer was lucky. He cried himself to sleep."

West's grotesque tale of the dark side of Hollywood still resonates--but like a bell with a crack in it. Nothing seems quite real, as the author depicts an artist, a retired hotel bookkeeper, a former vaudevillian reduced to selling silver polish, the vaudevillian's beautiful but intensely strange daughter, her other suitors, cockfighters, a successful screenwriter, but above all, the crowd of nonentities who inhabit the corners of the place, slowly building up their anger over being cheated by the California dream.The book is more notable for its scenes than for its overall story. I especially enjoyed the Battle of Waterloo that the artist witnesses on a back lot. All the while, the artist is working on his masterpiece, a painting called "The Burning of Los Angeles". West seems to find it a distinct possibility, and not from wildfires, but almost 75 years after this novel was written, not much has really changed. The little people are still little.

It is often difficult to separate the film version of a book from the work itself; this is the case for me with "Day of the Locust." I have tried not to compare the two, but unfortunately I rewatched the film about a week before I read the book. I had seen the film version (directed by John Schlesinger and released in 1975) of Nathanael West's iconic story of Depression-era Los Angeles years ago. Scenes and impressions had stuck with me -- like Homer Simpson sadly sitting in his backyard watching a lizard -- but I was still surprised by the book. It is quite different from the film in a number of important and interesting ways. It is rich and beautifully-written book, suffused with the atmosphere of the seedier side of Hollywood. While reading, I kept thinking about people like Charlie Sheen. Wealthy, yet relentlessly sleazy. In "Day of the Locust" we meet sleaze at both ends of the economic spectrum. Success in Hollywood is not predicated on integrity, kindness, or even good taste. One difference between the film and the book is the character of set designer/painter Tod Hackett. Schlesinger doesn't convey his violent thoughts in the film. Tod seems relatively benign and well-meaning in the film, a Yale man slumming it in Hollywood. But in the book he reveals himself to be more in his element than one might imagine; he fantasizes and raping and beating his neighbor, aspiring actress Fay Greener, who is 17 years old. Tod seems much more emotionally unstable. Slowly, Tod fills the walls of his apartment with apocalyptic sketches and studies in the film, but the book reveals that he's planning a large painting called "The Burning of Los Angeles." Those dark red drawings, with dead faces make more sense. The book emphasizes that these are all people who have come to Los Angeles to die. The book also creates a more nuanced portrait of Homer Simpson, although Donald Sutherland's portrayal in the film is perfect. Homer is the only sympathetic character -- and then he brings about a tragedy. Homer probably has some form of autism; he definitely suffers from Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. At one point, Tod asks him to stop doing the same thing with his hands and Homer answers, "I have to do it three times." He is so profoundly disturbed that you sense impending doom from the first time you meet him. The end of the book is horrific, but much is left to the reader's imagination. Thus, to me it was more effective than the violent and chaotic ending to Schlesinger's film. "Day of the Locust" is one of those books that I wish I could read for the first time again. It's disturbing and weirdly resonant with Los Angeles today. And I recommend reading the book before watching the film if you haven't seen it already.

An intriguing story about the unfulfilled promises of Hollywood in the 1930s. There does not appear to be a plot, but West's writing is so skillful and precise that you keep reading just to see, truly see--because his images ate so vivid--what he will describe next. Had to read this for school, but it exceeded my expectations.

I read this book for the first time forty years ago (yikes, can it really be forty years!) while I was in college. It's the best. Sets the mood of the character and and the story so well.

This is a quick read, and one which horrifies even as it amuses in its satiric view of Hollywood. Even now, more than a half century past its first publication, the picture West paints ensures moments of shock and recognition for American readers. Yet, every page is packed with entertainment, and with strong and scorching portrayals that are both horrifying and wonderful. Grotesques flourish in West's novel, and the view here seems almost voyeuristic, such intimacies are given. In whole, this is an unforgettable and striking work of fiction, highly recommended.

This is yet another "modern" book that consists of vile characters doing vile things to one another, people arranged like disjointed puppets, for the purpose of performing dehumanizing dances. I survived the profanity, the porn movie scene, but when the main character shared his desire to rape and went into detail about it, that was enough. The writing itself has spots of humor and occasional insights, but it weighed down by the unemotional lens of the narrator, whose tone is like that used in Camus' The Stranger -- cold, abstract, unmoved by pity or pain.

Fairly well-known, The Day of the Locust is a slim, funny, caustic novel about Hollywood's poisonous promise to the little people, actually and figuratively. Less well-known, Miss Lonelyhearts tracks the eponymous advice columnist as he reaches out to the cripples, broken-hearts and unbalanced who look to him for salvation.

I have to admit, I skimmed the last 20 pages or so. Not my type of book

Somewhat absurdist, slightly surreal. Great book on some of the struggles of modern, marginalized humanity. (Especially humanity in L.A./Hollywood.) The characters are all interesting and Unique. (Or quirky. Not sure which fits better.) Prose was spare, but (sort of...) poetic. Wonderful descriptions. 7/10

I recall this novel sort of coming close to being deeply significant somehow but it missed the mark in my opinion.

I read this years ago after seeing the movie on TV (apparently it was a flop in the cinema but I thought it was excellent). I think this is the only book I ever liked enough to reread immediately after finishing it - and I'm a very slow reader.

Nathanael West’s satire of 1930’s Hollywood, done mainly through its wannabes and outcasts, is pointed and ahead of his time. Behind the glittering image of Tinseltown, he shows us squalor, broken dreams, and a world where everything seems as phony as the facades of a set design. There are prostitutes, stage moms, and con men. The pretentiousness of those who have made it, with their ostentatious houses, are compared with the delusions of grandeur of those who haven’t, with their banal ideas for screenplays. He gives us various lifestyles that made me smile, since I didn’t realize how far back in time these stereotypical Hollywood images went, with vegetarians and those on a raw food diet, as well as those who attend alternative churches, such as the ‘Church of Christ, Physical’, “where holiness was attained through the constant use of chest-weights and spring grips”. He also doesn’t shy away from showing us cruelty in the form of cockfighting, or a dangerous mob. Even the protagonist who is navigating through this world has violent rape fantasies. West would die the following year at 37 in a car crash which is a shame, as this novel demonstrates his talent at making dark observations about the human condition, as well as an improved discipline and maturity as a writer. Just this quote, on people retiring in California:“Once there, they discover that sunshine isn’t enough. They get tired of oranges, even of avocado pears and passion fruit. Nothing happens. They don’t know what to do with their time. They haven’t the mental equipment for leisure, the money nor the physical equipment for pleasure. Did they slave so long just to go to an Iowa picnic? What else is there? They watch the waves come in at Venice. There wasn’t any ocean where most of them came from, but after you’ve seen one wave, you’ve seen them all. The same is true of the airplanes at Glendale. If only a plane would crash once in a while so that they could watch the passengers being consumed in a ‘holocaust of flame’, as the newspapers put it. But the planes never crash.Their boredom becomes more and more terrible. They realise that they’ve been tricked and burn with resentment. Every day of their lives they read the newspapers and went to the movies. Both fed them on lynchings, murder, sex crimes, explosions, wrecks, love nests, fires, miracles, revolutions, war. This daily diet made sophisticates of them. The sun is a joke. Oranges can’t titillate their jaded palates. Nothing can ever be violent enough to make taut their slack minds and bodies.”

With a little bit of distance I can see that this is an accomplished novel, well written and stunningly relevant in places for all that it is seventy years old. The problem is that I just did not enjoy it! In fact, it left me feeling slightly uncomfortable and more than a little unclean. I appreciate it for its clever story telling but would struggle to recommend or to re-read. Plot in a Nutshell Less plot and more a study of a group of characters as told by Tod Hackett, a relatively recent arrival to Depression era Hollywood. Through his interactions with the would be stars, in reality minor extras with limited opportunity we see a spotlight shone on the promise of the American dream. ThoughtsOn paper the Golden Age of Hollywood is in full swing and the Depression sweeping the rest of America seems quieter here. However hiding not very far below the surface is a Hollywood where dreams don’t stand up to scrutiny and dreamers come to die. So far so depressing right? It gets worse… West compellingly paints a picture of cynical, self serving characters – at first glance they all seem slightly overdone and almost caricatured versions of our current worst thoughts about Hollywood. It took me a little while to remind myself that this was not a modern day satirical take on Hollywood but rather an ‘of the age’ satirical take on Hollywood. The more we get to know them however we see each has zero ability for them to emotionally connect with each other – each interaction is underpinned by a strong sense of ‘what’s in it for me’. If West wanted to paint a soulless environment and relationships he succeeded. And that’s before was addressing the fact that main character is open to discussing his fantasies of raping the woman he is infatuated with. On the subject of strong female characters; Faye is a real disappointment. The lust the male characters have for her permeates the book and should have the reader feeling much more sympathetic. She is after all still a teenager predominantly spending time with much older men. She is however decidedly unsympathetic and her manipulations of her would be suitors meant I could not connect with her at all. As a metaphor for Hollywood itself she was well written, as a character you could empathise with less so

The three stars are all for The Day of the Locust, which is good if obvious. The Dream Life of Balso Snell is poor.

Tod Hackett works as an artist for a Hollywood movie studio, but his mind and energy are always on Faye Greener, a teenage extra. To be in love with Faye is torture, as she has plenty of men after her and a father who was a stage comic but is now just annoying. The main problem with Faye is that she cares for no one, only her dreams of becoming a star.Showing the hazards of celebrity with its crushed hopes and the fans who will form a mob to get near fame, this is a brilliantly written story, almost a noir with its femme fatale who leaves misery behind her. This would have been a 5 star for me if it weren't for a very graphic cockfight scene.

Every once in a while I revisit Nathanial West - a writer I have read before - to see if my reaction to his work has changed any. The Day of the Locust is the book everyone knows about (Though I think Miss Lonelyhearts is the better writing.)If the American Dream is fortune and fame and having people know your name, then hunger and need for same is the American Nightmare. And West is its poet laureate."Locust" is a story of Hollywood where everybody wants to be a star. We meet starlets and child actors and fading vaudevillians who believe in nothing any more, not even themselves. It is very much not pretty about money and sex and "art" and power and you know West knows whereof he speaks. But watching these grotesques and monsters flailing away at each other like scorpions in a bottle isn't much fun. The California sun burns and bakes but does not in the end illuminate. A book to admire if perhaps in the end a book not easy to love. If he had lived a few years longer . . . who knows what he might have written?

The Depression hits Hollywood and those seeking stardom. Populated by shallow characters striving for fortune and fame. A good expose. Insightful for those aspiring toward an actor's life.

A curious 'period piece' with a disappointingly abrupt ending.

I could have sworn I'd read this book forty years ago, but reading it now disabused me of that notion. The early chapters seemed vaguely familiar, but soon the plot seemed totally new. I'm glad I I dipped into it for a second time. It's a great exploration of the decadence of Hollywood in the early 1930's

A quick read classic about those who fail to succeed in the simulated back lots of Los Angeles’ sordid sprawling terrain circa 1930’s. Nathanael West focuses on how women drive men to ruin, desperation, violence and ultimately, the burning of Los Angeles both figuratively and metaphorically. Pent up sexual aggression is probably the underlining theme- the artist narrator never gets what he wants- and by the end of the book even fails to imagine rape while eating a piece of finely prepared dead cow…West fills his canonical tale with other despairing emotions in his 1939 Los Angeles. Not much has changed. Not to be read while happy, which is why I read it during an atrocious complacent and ennui filled trip to the star-studded falsity I grew up in.