The Bridge of San Luis Rey

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Summary: a book lover
Review: one of the greatest books i will ever read. so deep and so beautifully written, everyone must read it!

Rating:
Summary: Was it fate?
Review: Thorton Wilder's "The Bridge of San Luis Rey" tells of the life,times and tragic deaths of five people. The character of Brother Juniper is witness to this catastrophy and decides to find out if it is simply an accident of punishment from god. The detail of the characters and their lives are phenominal and the characters themselves will be imprinted into the back of your mind for days. I would recomend this Pulitzer Prize Novel "The Bridges of San Luis Rey" to anyone who has ever been intrested in Spanish folklore. The reading may be difficult at times due to the translations, but it is well worth the time to go back and reread the passage. Although all the book is not clear you you still get a good grasp of the story.

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Summary: One of the Most Moving Books I Ever Read
Review: This Pulitzer Prize winner is one of the most poetic, profound books I can remember reading. Thank heavens I didn't read it when I was young.

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Summary: Who did it?
Review: This was the first time I ever read Thornton Wilder. He is master of the written word. While reading the novel I felt as if I could be reading a dramatic play (rather watching one unfold before my eyes). As the reader you grow very attached to these quirky, eccentric, ordinary individuals. I especially felt deeply for The Marquesa de Montemayor. She is such a tragis woman. I won't go on to say how much I loved the ending, I'd have to give a spoiler and I don;t want to ruin this great read for anyone! Let's just say that I could feel the threat of tears at the back and corners of my eyes. The last 3 sentences, I think, are wonderful and leave the reader thinking. It did for me anyway. It really touched my soul. I had the strong deisre to share those lines with the people around me. I did. Now I suggest you pick up this book and read it and share it with otehrs around you!

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Summary: A literary practitioner of gracious artistry
Review: One tends to forget how graceful a writer Thornton Wilder was.

The bridge between Lima and Cuzco broke. It was 1714. It had been made by the Incas with thin slats. A little red-haried Franciscan, Brother Juniper, from Italy did something about the rent in the bridge of San Luis Rey. Brother Juniper wanted to determine why the five people who died had been fated to lose their lives on that bridge. He wanted to experiment, to explain the ways of God to men. He spent six years investigating the lives of the victims.

The Marquesa de Montemayor was separated from her daughter, the Condesa, who lived in Spain. She learned her daughter was expecting a child. In time she made a typical Peruvian pilgrimage to the shrine of Santa Maria de Cluxambuqua. Even before the Incan civilization the ground was holy.

Esteban and Manuel were foundlings. Twins, they invented a secret language for themselves. The language was a symbol of their identity with one another. Their unity was broken by a love of women.

Uncle Pio was active, but nothing made him rich. He came from Europe. He traveled with a cafe singer, the Perichole. Uncle Pio never ceased watching Camila, the Perichole. She became impatient with acting and wanted to become a lady.

A new bridge of stone was built. Brother Juniper's book was held to be heretical. There is a land of the living and a land of the dead, and the bridge is love.

Rating:
Summary: Life or Death, Accident or Intention
Review: "On Friday noon, July the twentieth, 1714, the finest bridge in all Peru broke and precipitated five travelers into the gulf below." When Brother Juniper witnesses this tragedy first-hand, he resolves to find in it scientific evidence of God's plan. The randomness of this evident, in Juniper's mind, makes it the perfect laboratory for investigating this question. "Here at last one could surprise His intentions in a pure state." Before the victims had even hit the ground, he already plans on investigating their lives. Short, beautiful, and nearly perfect, THE BRIDGE OF SAN LUIS REY earned Thornton Wilder the first of his three Pulitzer prizes.

The lives of the five victims of the bridge are thoroughly recounted leading up to the moment they all came together to cross the bridge. Brother Juniper came up with his conclusions regarding the tragedy, but ultimately, he was not satisfied with his results. He did, however, realize that he learned least about the victims in question in speaking with those that were close to them. It was these very survivors, however, away from Juniper's questions and after the friar's execution who ultimately did find some answers.

I was moved by the final conclusion of the book: that out lives are transient and unremarkable but to those whom we love and who love us, and our very existence dies with those that cared for us. "...almost no one remembers Esteban and Pepita but myself... But soon we shall die and all memory of those five will have left the earth, and we ourselves should be loved for awhile and forgotten. But the love will have been enough..." I can't find a better argument for living in the moment.

Jeremy W. Forstadt

Rating:
Summary: a quiet study of lives lived
Review: There is not much to The Bridge at San Luis Rey. In the opening chapter the entire premise is undone, telling of one Brother Juniper and his quest to prove God's motive in a terrible accident that claimed five diverse lives. The narration of this part goes on to tell us that Brother Juniper was unsuccessful in his quest and was eventually charged with heresy for this undertaking and burned at the stake. We then go back in time and learn about the distinctive lives of these five victims, both of their lives and their affect on those around them. It is a quite beautiful story, sweet and hopeful at the end, an enduring picture of lives having meaning and, regardless of the abandonment of the story's initial premise, really quite effective and engaging. Four and a half, rounded down because the book a read immediately prior to it was something held very special in my heart.

Rating:
Summary: an elegant set of stories that tugs at the heart strings...
Review: 'The Bridge of San Luis Rey' is a deceptively simple set of inter-related stories about a handful of people who perish when a primitive bridge collapses in eighteenth century Peru. Sounds dull? Well,.. wrong. Thornton Wilder does a fine job in describing personal angst and hardship of these people; their plight can easily be told in a modern setting. I was especially moved by the one story of a older woman trying to come to terms with the decaying relationship between herself and her daughter. Yet, unsurprisingly, not all the stories affected me personally. Sort of hit-and-miss. But in the end I felt moved by it all; this short book does leave you with the feeling you've read something significant.

Bottom line: an uneven but ultimately very satisfying read.