The City and the Pillar : A Novel

Rating:
Summary: The City and the Pillar
Review: I always have high expectations for books that broke the rules- particularly those that make their writers suffer needlessly due to society's close-minded bigotry. So I was rather taken by the *concept* of Gore Vidal's 1948 novel "The City and the Pillar," but ultimately I found it wanting. In fact, despite the budding romances of handsome young atheletes and showy movie stars, it ended up as quite a dry read. Vidal is dispassionate as he relates young Jim Willard's youthful misadventures of love and lust while searching for his high school crush, who he still holds a flame for years after a timid sexual tryst on a camping trip. His characters seem to me a bit two-dimensional and undeveloped, lacking any basis for their shallow and arid personalities- no one is born acting how they do when they mature, but when the reader is presented with only the face and there are no attempts to divulge the motivations they quickly get irked. The only character whom Vidal seems to make any token attempt to reveal to us is Maria Verlain; even more attentions are given to her than to the protagonist. He describes Maria's many facets with more scrutiny than he'd allow any of Jim's lovers throughout the novel. Why is it Vidal can't manage to give more depth to the shallow Shaw, or spare a few words to tell us the source of the pessimist-masochist Sullivan's eternal grief? Overall, the novel isn't worth analysis so as to find the means to praise it. Daring, yes, but few other endearing attributes show their face in Vidal's sparse, pruned sentences that lack the vitality that is emblazoned upon every page of a good book.

Rating:
Summary: An early classic - rediscovered
Review: In the world of arts and letters euphemisms such as "trail blazing" and "groundbreaking" are too often bandied about by over reaching publicists and press agents. In the case of Gore Vidal's gay-lit classic "The City and the Pillar" (which is being reissued this December by Vintage International), these phrases seem like understatements.

Reading this novel again after more then twenty years, I was moved by the clarity and brevity of the prose. Vidal doesn't mince words, but rather cuts to the heart of the matter - Jim Willard is in love with Bob Ford. What bigns as simple boyhood buggery, develops into an all consuming passion, sadly unrequited and ultimately tragic.

By tackling a subject considered taboo, Vidal exposed various aspects of the homosexual psyche and the underground gay community as they existed in the 1940s. Readers will note the influence this once shocking work has had on a number of contemporary writers. Vidal remains both a maverick and literary hero.

Rating:
Summary: An early classic - rediscovered
Review: In the world of arts and letters euphemisms such as "trail blazing" and "groundbreaking" are too often bandied about by over reaching publicists and press agents. In the case of Gore Vidal's gay-lit classic "The City and the Pillar" (which is being reissued this December by Vintage International), these phrases seem like understatements.

Reading this novel again after more then twenty years, I was moved by the clarity and brevity of the prose. Vidal doesn't mince words, but rather cuts to the heart of the matter - Jim Willard is in love with Bob Ford. What bigns as simple boyhood buggery, develops into an all consuming passion, sadly unrequited and ultimately tragic.

By tackling a subject considered taboo, Vidal exposed various aspects of the homosexual psyche and the underground gay community as they existed in the 1940s. Readers will note the influence this once shocking work has had on a number of contemporary writers. Vidal remains both a maverick and literary hero.

Rating:
Summary: A novel about idealized love and the harsh reality of it
Review: Jim Willard spends a final weekend with his friend Bob Ford at a cabin before Bob heads off to sea, like they talked abouts. They're very close friends, and during this weekend of horseplay and relaxation, Jim and Bob take it to the next level. Before they leave the cabin, Jim promises to hook up with Bob once he's graduated. A year later, and with the memory of that weekend at the cabin still floating through his mind, Jim sets off to find the elusive love of his llfe, going to see, becoming ensnared in the glitz of Hollywood, traveling to South America, but clinging to his love for Bob and never letting himself fall completely for any other men.

This novel beautifully tells the story of a young man's search for the ideal person -- or who he thinks is the ideal -- one who is in tune with him in every way. The characters are all well-written, and you really feel that you are right alongside Jim as he makes his way through the world.

In the introduction, Vidal talks about how he re-wrote the entire book after its initial publication due to public reaction to the original, tragic ending. The re-written ending, I feel, is much stronger and shows what happens when the ideal becomes tarnished in the idolizer's eyes. It's a remarkable book that discusses homosexuality in a very open way for a novel from 1945. A thoroughly enjoyable read.

Rating:
Summary: Historically Significant; Literarily Weak
Review: Originally published in 1948, THE CITY AND THE PILLAR is generally considered the first mainstream American novel to place gay men and their lives and loves at dead center of the story. As such, it receives a tremendous amount of attention from critics and historians. Still, for all the stir it caused at the time (most newspapers wouldn't review or advertise it and many bookstores refused to carry it), it is more interesting for its history than for itself.

The story concerns Jim, an all-American boy from Virginia, who has a sexual encounter with classmate Bob just before Bob graduates from highschool and leaves town "to go to sea." This is Jim's first same-sex encounter, and with classic adolescent innocence he concludes that he and Bob are spiritual "twins." As soon as he graduates, Jim goes in search of Bob on the assumption that Bob feels the same--and driven by this obsession he too "goes to sea," and moves from port to port and eventually from relationship to relationship in search of his ever-elusive lost love.

In a sense, THE CITY AND THE PILLAR gives us a window on what it must have been like to have been a young gay man in this era; at first Jim has absolutely no frame of reference for his sexuality, and when he begins to discover that men who have sex with men are not uncommon he resists thinking of himself as "one of those." But the overwhelming problem with the novel is that Jim is not a greatly interesting person, nor is Bob, nor are any of the people that Jim encounters while he looks for Bob. It soon becomes difficult to care about Jim, much less about whether or not he will ever find Bob and what will happen if he does.

Vidal himself was not greatly happy with the novel as it was published in 1948, and he rewrote it for a 1960s reprint. (The original 1948 version, which has a very different ending and slightly different tone, is no longer widely available.) But in rewriting the novel, Vidal did not go far enough: the characters are just as tedious in the second version as they were in the first. While I applaud Vidal for taking on such then-hot subject matter, I can't really praise what he did with it either originally or in the rewrite. Fortunately, if you feel you must read the novel due to its historical significance, it is fairly short--and that, really, is the best thing I can say for it.

GFT, Amazon Reviewer

Rating:
Summary: Historically Significant; Literarily Weak
Review: Originally published in 1948, THE CITY AND THE PILLAR is generally considered the first mainstream American novel to place gay men and their lives and loves at dead center of the story. As such, it receives a tremendous amount of attention from critics and historians. Still, for all the stir it caused at the time (most newspapers wouldn't review or advertise it and many bookstores refused to carry it), it is more interesting for its history than for itself.

The story concerns Jim, an all-American boy from Virginia, who has a sexual encounter with classmate Bob just before Bob graduates from highschool and leaves town "to go to sea." This is Jim's first same-sex encounter, and with classic adolescent innocence he concludes that he and Bob are spiritual "twins." As soon as he graduates, Jim goes in search of Bob on the assumption that Bob feels the same--and driven by this obsession he too "goes to sea," and moves from port to port and eventually from relationship to relationship in search of his ever-elusive lost love.

In a sense, THE CITY AND THE PILLAR gives us a window on what it must have been like to have been a young gay man in this era; at first Jim has absolutely no frame of reference for his sexuality, and when he begins to discover that men who have sex with men are not uncommon he resists thinking of himself as "one of those." But the overwhelming problem with the novel is that Jim is not a greatly interesting person, nor is Bob, nor are any of the people that Jim encounters while he looks for Bob. It soon becomes difficult to care about Jim, much less about whether or not he will ever find Bob and what will happen if he does.

Vidal himself was not greatly happy with the novel as it was published in 1948, and he rewrote it for a 1960s reprint. (The original 1948 version, which has a very different ending and slightly different tone, is no longer widely available.) But in rewriting the novel, Vidal did not go far enough: the characters are just as tedious in the second version as they were in the first. While I applaud Vidal for taking on such then-hot subject matter, I can't really praise what he did with it either originally or in the rewrite. Fortunately, if you feel you must read the novel due to its historical significance, it is fairly short--and that, really, is the best thing I can say for it.

GFT, Amazon Reviewer

Rating:
Summary: a tribute to Jimmie Trimble
Review: The first time I read "The City And The Pillar" I was less than blown away. Vidal presents us with a story of first love and passion, but he tells it somewhat dispassionately. The ending in particular did not jive with the nature of the characters. Time passed without me thinking much of this novel until I read "Palimpsest" (Vidal's Memoirs). Palimsest introduces us to the real characters behind TC&TP. I gained a whole new angle to view Maria Verlain with the revelation that she was/is Anias Nin. Likewise, I was introduced to Jimmie Trimble, Vidal's best friend (in Plato's sense of the word) and first love. Jimmie is much more real in "Palimpsest" and I found it difficult not fall in love with him myself, a feeling the characters in TC&TP never inspired. I don't want this to sound like I'm putting down TC&TP, I'm not. I just want to convey that the story was exponentially more powerful and moving after I read "Palimpsest." I do recomend this book, but only after reading Vidal's memoirs. The real Jimmie is infinitely more beautiful than the Jimmie Vidal morphed into fiction.

Rating:
Summary: Ham-fisted and completely lacking in nuance
Review: [...]

In "The City and the Pillar" Vidal makes every symbol a bludgeon and beats his readers over the head with it. (Hint: the pillar is a phallic symbol!)The structure of the novel is practically outlined in bullet-points before each chapter. When, at the climactic moment he tells us that the circle is complete (actual phrase!) and that this is the climax of the novel, I threw the book at the wall.

The book might be appropriate as a Young Adult novel for a struggling gay teenager reading years below his or her grade level, but I'd hesitate there too. It's got all the nuance and subtelty of a YA novel, but it really does try to be an actual piece of literary fiction. Shame, because it could almost be a decent after-school special.