About this title: Told in four parts, the book describes the American takeover from Japan of an island in the South Pacific during World War II. Many military details, combined with intermittent narrative about the characters, offer a microcosm of United States political and social history. These various characters must work together in order for their mission to succeed. The novel explores social cohesion, the military mind, class conflicts, and political ideology.
Note: This is a general synopsis. Each listing is described below.
Edition: Edition not stated
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, New York
Date Published: 1948
Description: Good. No dust jacket. The bottom corners and the head of the backstrip are bumped. There are three small stains on the foredge that go slightly onto the edge of the text. There is one dog-eared corner, else the text is in very good condition. 626 p. map. 22 cm. read more
Description: Very good. Book has appearance of light use with no easily noticeable wear. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Description: Good. Former Library book. Shows some signs of wear, and may have some markings on the inside. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Binding: Mass-market paperback
Publisher: Signet Book
Date Published: 1948
Description: Fair. No dust jacket as issued. Softcover book in fair condition, pages yellow, cover wear, light stain on first few pages. Mass market (rack) paperback. Glued binding. Audience: General/trade. read more
Edition: 6th Printing
Binding: Mass Market Paperback
Publisher: Signet, New York
Date Published: 1951
Description: Fair. 12mo-over 6¾"-7¾" tall. Bookstore stamp inside. A few pages loose or detached, however book is complete. Tape repair to spine. Small chip missing from front wrap. Creasing and wear. More of a reading copy with clean pages. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Rinehart
Date Published: 1969
Description: Very Good- NO JACKET. VG-/NO DJ, black cloth, a little chipping to the cloth at head of spine else, mild cover wear noted, interior clean, binding tight. read more
"I wonder if there is such a thing as a pro-war novel? I don't know. It seems like, before hailing The Naked and the Dead as the great anti-war epic that planted seeds of counterculture in a fertile postwar angst, I should know that. Flowery praises aside, Mailer has something here. And although war is kind of a huge subject, Mailer succeeds in personalizing and bringing the realities of combat. No one's death, in all 700-something pages, can be directly ascribed to the Japanese. That, in and of itself, is not particularly groundbreaking. I guess with any death you could sniff out a scapegoat of your choice. But Mailer seems to take special pains to directly implicate anyone but the Japanese in the platoon's casualties. In the interest of not spoiling anything, I won't go into details, but I will never climb a mountain again. At least, not if I have to jump over any kind of abyss. Especially not after I've been race-baited. Enough said. Read this book, at least once in your life. And then burn your draft card or flick off a general or something."
"Norman Mailer served as a cook in the Pacific War, but that still afforded him the opportunity to acquire more than enough material to write some thrilling and visceral prose about combat.
The novel charts the invasion of a Pacific island largely through the eyes of a single platoon and its members. Most of the book is concerned with the soldiers relationships to one another, by turns affectionate through to bullying and sadistic. The characters he draws are complex and he doesn't pull any punches with the flaws on show, ranging from anti-semitism, through misogyny right along to the outright psychotic. Mailer also employs an effective flashback device whereby the main narrative is intercut with chapters detailing episodes from individual characters's lives in pre-war America.
The book's main strength comes from the highly convincing characterisation. That the author wrote it in his early twenties is extremely impressive."
"Since there are already 139 reviews of this book, I doubt that anyone will ever read my little grumblings about this. I read this book for my freshman or soph. American Lit. class which just happened to be in 1969 or '70. Talk about timing!
I had to read and critique it for the final exam. I hated the book, and it certainly gave me a really clear idea of what the kids in Vietnam were going through. "By the time I finished, I felt I was naked, and I wished I were dead," or something to that effect. The only reason that this is emblazoned on my memory is that the professor said, as soon as he had the blue books in his hands, "I hope you liked it. It's 40% of your grade." Then I knew that I had my wish.
Although it's been 40 years since I read it, and I hated every minute of it, as I recall, I think that it made me anti-war for the rest of my life. As I've been reading the reviews here, I haven't come across one yet that comments on it from a personal experience with combat point of reference. And many of the positive reviewers are male, (big surprise).
I certainly appreciate the refresher course on the details, about the personal portraits of the men, and the combat section. The fear, the hate, the futility of resolving conflict in this primeval way washes back over me.
The other novel about war I read in those very impressionable years was Catch-22. Perhaps you might consider reading that in proximity to this, if I haven't dissuaded you yet. Together, with a little Kurt Vonnegut thrown in there (Cats Cradle, perhaps?), could change your life."
"This book is about a company of soldiers stationed on an island in the South Pacific during WWII. They are alternately bored out of their minds and scared out of their wits. No, that's really too pat. This book is a masterpiece of realism---every character, from the lowly privates to the General of the battalion, is so vividly realized that I find it hard to believe these people never actually existed. I think that is what impressed me the most about this book. And even though some parts were a little slow I couldn't stop thinking about it. Be warned: this book is not light reading. It's pretty bleak and the ending is chilling but it's very much worth it."
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