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Summary: McTeague is a prophetic masterpiece!
Review: McTeague is one of the greatest works of "classic American literature" I have ever read. Frank Norris was a genius at being able to size up the inhumanity of humanity & roll it all up in one great big nasty ball of literature that packs a punch that will knock you on your bum! McTeague is an uncaring brute who knows not the chaos that he creates. His wife is a gullible victim with a heart of gold. His best friend is ready to steal away his most prized posession. To top it all off is an ending for the ages that will leave one of the most stark, naked pictures presented in all of literature's annals. Many people will not enjoy McTeague because of the sheer brutality & the negative, crushing tone of the novel. For those of you who don't need rainbows & unicorns in a novel, I have a feeling you'll be absolutely thrilled by this American masterpiece.
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Summary: Thinking about this book sends a chill down my spine!
Review: I had to read this book for one of English classes in high school. I like most literature, but I have to say that I think Mcteague is a very, insignificantly strange, messed up piece of literature. That's all I wanted to say.
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Summary: Hearts of darkness
Review: Bleak and horrible. One of the nastiest trips into the human soul ever submitted to print. Brilliant, but not for those who only like fairy tales with pleasant endings.
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Summary: Glad I stumbled across a great book and a wonderful writer
Review: I was in the bookstore scanning the fiction section and looking for both a "classic" and something "different" when I came across this gem. I had never heard of the book or Frank Norris before, but the back-cover synopsis grabbed me. I am glad I picked it up, because it's a wonderful, insighful work that's still fairly brutal today (I can only imagine what reaction was a century ago!). Norris' greatest skill is making Mr. & Mrs. McTeague's rapid changes in fortune and the various low and highlifes around them so realistic and alive. And though it did drag in some places (their early marriage), the last 1/3 was hard to put down, and in retrospect, I can totally see how Norris paced it like he did. Next, I'll tackle his "Octopus" and see if it also measures up.
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Summary: Predictable and repetitive, but that's the point.
Review: It is true that aspects of this story are continually repeated. The repitions are vital to Norris' powerful story of the lost "American Dream". I had to read this book while in high school and I just read it again a few months ago. I would suggest that anyone who has read it once as a young person to read it again. The meaning will be greatly enhanced as you have learned about the world we are all living in.
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Summary: A predictable, naturalistic novel.
Review: This book was very repetitive and predictable that it seemed to continue forever. I would not have finished the book except I was forced to take reading quizzes everyday in AP English. It was evident from the description of McTeague in the first few chapters that he was going to murder someone with his enormous strength. I was relieved when he finally met Marcus in the middle of the desert because it was obvious two hundred pages earlier that McTeague was going to kill him, and as soon as they met in Death Valley I knew the book was finally over
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Summary: McTeague and his neighbors are America's bottom feeders.
Review: As a high school literature teacher, I have helped hundreds of students experience turn-of-the-century San Francisco and the inhabitants of Polk Street. Mac and his neighbors are examples of what bad genes, bad fortune, and bad liquor--or nowadays, bad drugs--can produce, and only slightly exaggerated caricatures of people my students know. Norris's detatched style and his humor make the kids shake their heads and grin.
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Summary: As dangerous as a Comanche attack, and somber as steam beer.
Review: The Norris novel stuns the senses. It is the Cadillac of ingenuity. drama vs. rest. the rest, and the rest...descriptive and natural. one of the few books to captivate so well with a slow, sleepy head hero. one that starts out different, but is turned like the rest, violent and vengeful, illogical. and then raging, crying. like a wounded beast. and Norris uses repetition and the placement of vastness to dig the graves of the vulgar people that inhabit the novel's space. repition, crossed by the unexpected.
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Summary: interesting view of San Francisco in the 19th century
Review: McTeague was a very interesting book. It was a great example of naturalism and cultural values in the 19th century. It shows the relationships between man vs. nature and the animal instincts that are present in humans. Norris quickly pulls the reader into the scene with his incredible description of San Francisco and the people who live there. The book was fast moving and kept my inerest to the very end.
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Summary: A commentary on Greed
Review: Mcteague, a novel by Frank Norris, is a book which shows how greed can destroy a person's life. Hardworking Mcteague suddenly comes into som money when his wife wins the lottery. He thiks this is cause to celebrate, but he doesn't know how wrong he is. Soon, his best friend turns on him when he feels he has a legitimate claim to the money. A man named Zerkow is driven to murder when he finds that his wife may be withholding very value pottery from him. Almost everybody in the book is devastated in one way or another from their greed. This book is an excellent satire of the evils of greed.
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