The Adventures Of Augie March

THE ADVENTURES OF AUGIE MARCH
by Saul Bellow

 Award: National Book Winner 1954, Nobel Prize Winner 1954

 Date Read: April 18, 2019

 I settled down with this novel with the highest expectations. The National Book Award? Yes! The Modern Library's 100 Best Novels? #81! Bring it on!

 The first 10 pages, I thought there must be some mistake. Page after page of painstaking and tedious detail served as a forewarning this was going to be an arduous and demanding slog. And then? As I kept reading, I slowly started falling in love - the depth, the quality of writing, the sheer ambition of it. In short, this was a slow love affair that took a while to catch fire. But catch fire it did!

 The Adventures Of Augie March is a sweeping tale of the misadventures of a man trying to find his place in this world. Fatherless and with a mother that seems to be hampered by low intellect, Augie begins his life from the most humble beginnings and flits through it as if a leaf on a breeze. He never exactly sets a course for his ambition, frolicking from place to place and relationship to relationship without any forethought or intention. 

 Over the course of his life, Augie is a movie bill distributor, newspaper, knick-knack and rubber paint salesman, attempted immigrant smuggler, dog groomer, book thief, coal weigher, union organizer, research assistant and merchant marine. His travels take him from Chicago to Mexico to Paris. 

At some point, you want to scream at him, "Augie, Augie, Augie. Pull your shit together, man!" But then, of course, had he, this novel wouldn't be nearly as fun. Although he ultimately does pull it together in the end, finally living with intention, the road is long and winding, ending ultimately with a sense of fulfillment and finally finding what the reader can only hope is lasting love.

 Ranked #81 in the Modern Library's 100 Best Novels.

 Looking Forward: Henderson The Rain King, Herzog, Humboldt's Gift, Mr. Sammler's Planet, Seize The Day

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