Binding: Trade Paperback
Publisher: Delta, New York
Date Published: 1968
Description: Fair. No Jacket. Ex-Library Fair+ Ex-library book. Trade paperback. Cover was sealed in clear plastic with black tape around edges to protect it. Usual lilbrary markings. Pages have tanned, otherwise good. 138 pages. A very nice copy. read more
Edition: Sixth Printing
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Laurel Leaf Books, New York
Date Published: 1976
Description: Very Good. 16mo 6"-7" tall; 167 pages; Mass market paperback rubbed at edges and spine ends. Lightly creased at front hinge. Aqua blue photo cover. Text pages clean and tight. Bagged for protection. read more
Edition: Second Printing
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Delta
Date Published: 1969
Description: Good. Paperback cover shows moderate wear and light creasing. Pages clean. Binding tight. In stock and ready for immediate shipment. read more
Binding: Mass Market Paperback
Publisher: Dell Publishing Company; A Laurel Edition
Date Published: 1973
Description: Good. GOOD SOFTCOVER COPY WITH CLEAN, CRISP PAGES AND TIGHT BINDING. PAGES ARE SLIGHTLY TANNED DUE TO AGE. BOOK SHOWS LIGHT EDGE WEAR. FRONT AND BACK COVERS ARE TANNED. GOOD READING COPY. ALL OF OUR ITEMS ARE GUARANTEED. WE SHIP DAILY WITH TRACKING. read more
Binding: Softcover
Publisher: Dell
Date Published: 1968
Description: "In Watermelon Sugar the deeds were done and done again as my life is done. " Close to fine and bright pictorial stiff wraps with strong spine and clean text throughout. read more
Edition: Fourth Printing
Binding: Trade Paperback
Publisher: Dell Publishing Co, New York
Date Published: 1968
Description: Good. No jacket, as issued. Wear to tips, corners, edges, rear cover discolored, light creasing to front cover, stain to first page of text. read more
Edition: NEW ED
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: VINTAGE Country = UNITED KINGDOM
Date Published: 2002
ISBN-13:9780099437598ISBN:0099437597
Description: BRAND NEW PAPERBACK. 142 pages. (142 pages) death is a place where the sun shines a different colour every day and where people travel to the length of their dreams. rejecting the violence and hate of the old gang at the forgotten works, they lead gentle lives in watermelon sugar. the author expresses the mood of a new generation. edition new ed (Paperback) read more
Binding: Trade Paperback
Publisher: Delta Books, New York
Date Published: 1969
Description: Very Good. No Jacket. Light blue cover with the black and white photograph of richard brautigan and pretty lady, clean. corners very lightly bumped. light crease at hinge, no crease at spine. dried water imprint on back four or five pages and back cover, minor. previous owners name at top ffep. text clean, 138 pages. 2nd. printing. nice copy. read more
Edition: First Thus
Binding: Softcover
Publisher: Picador, UK
Date Published: 1973
ISBN-13:9780330234436ISBN:0330234439
Description: Good+ 8vo-over 7¾"-9¾" tall. PB, pictorial card covers, G+/--, 142pp. gENERAL rubbing to edges and creases to corners of covers, inside has tanning to pages, a browner stin to lower coner of the text block, else square, & tight with no markings. The strange mellow mood of the 1970s after the summer of love. 170g when packed. read more
"This book is so pretty, it's in a world of its own, and that world is a magical one. It's the kind of book that requires little effort, it just carries it along with you, you become submersed in it. It's a book based on little things, not the big picture, where the people float around with no higher purpose than to simply live in their wonderful watermelon based world.
Nothing in this little world of watermelon sugar ever quite seems complete, nothing ever happens, the world just goes around in little circles, the people are trapped. But for me this book was liberating, it took me out of the world for a couple of short hours, away from the stresses of reality, and lost me in the colourful world of a nameless artist as he walks along the river banks of an all too distant utopia."
"This was an interesting pick for the Pittsburgh Dystopian Science Fiction book club, in that, it was only obliquely dystopian. In fact, it would probably not even qualify as dystopian by some definitions. It does take place in a society heavily controlled by convention and an interesting aspect of the weather affecting the city's watermelon agriculture.
For most of the characters in the book--- almost all of them really, including the protagonist--- this is a communalist utopia. Everyone has their own cabin retreats as well as their rooms in town, and they can come and go according to how much social time they enjoy. They can dine together in the main hall with their friends or eat alone in an outlying cafe.
And the whole society runs on sugar made from massively expansive watermelon crops.
I think the main question about this story is: what happens to the people who aren't happy in a utopia? There are a few characters in the book who simply don't fit in, even in a society flexible enough to let everyone do whatever it is that they feel they need to do: drink moonshine constantly, exist without a name, walk around a junkyard all day and night while mourning a lost love, quit working in order to write a book, or for a few minutes bring to a complete stop the industry that runs the town just to show a friend a bat who's taken up residence under the machinery.
I've never read anything by Brautigan, but this story--- which I read in one sitting--- was very beautiful, even if a little sad sometimes. Here's one of my favorite passages:
"Doc Edwards was walking down the street from Ron's shack and a dog was following behind him, sniffing his footsteps. The dog stopped at one particular footstep and stood there with its tail wagging above the footstep. The dog really liked that one.""
"I'm sorry, but what? In Watermelon Sugar was a complete and utter waste of time and I question the people who find any value in it whatsoever. I like symbolism and ambiguity as much as the next person but if there was was any meaning to be found in this pretentious drivel, then it was lost on me.
It could just be Brautigan's writing style, but everything seemed very sparse. Even iDeath, for all its color changing suns and watermelon galore and intelligent tigers, seemed superficial. It seemed as if Brautigan put those things in there for the hell of it.
I was also disturbed by the inhabitants of iDeath. They remain unaffected by near everything. Even as iBoil and his gang cut off their noses, ears, fingers, the people of iDeath remain completely calm and indifferent. Margaret's suicide is just as easily brushed off.
Very simply, this book seemed to be written by a hippie while on an acid trip. It was pointless. May it fall into obscurity."
"The 4-star rating is a compromise between different readings at different times of my life. Once I even loved this book, a sort of hippie fairytale, in which unpleasant possessiveness and alcohol abuse (bad) poison pleasant promiscuity and marijuana use (good). This was my favorite part:
We went over and lay upon her bed. I took her dress off. She had nothing on underneath. We did that for a while. Then I got up and took off my overalls and lay back down beside her.
That's a fairly representative sampling of his writing style, which now strikes me as a little silly and affected. Overalls! Does that capture the moment or what? Actually I still like the opening line; In watermelon sugar the deeds were done and done again as my life is done in watermelon sugar. It doesn't mean anything, but it sounds nice."
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