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Falconer

3.64 of 5 stars 3.64 · rating details · 2,903 ratings · 154 reviews

Stunning and brutally powerful, Falconer tells the story of a man named Farragut, his crime and punishment, and his struggle to remain a man in a universe bent on beating him back into childhood. Only John Cheever could deliver these grand themes with the irony, unforced eloquence, and exhilarating humor that make Falconer such a triumphant work of the moral imagination.

Paperback, 224 pages

Published January 15th 1992 by Vintage (first published 1977)

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99th out of 101 books — 314 voters

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May 05, 2011 Kemper rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 100, classic-lit, prison, 2011

Falconer Correctional Facility certainly sounds dreary and no place I’d want to spend any time, but it doesn’t seem nearly as bad as many fictional prisons. In fact, it seems pretty dull. There weren’t any beatings from brutal guards. There’s no racial tension evident. No one gets shivved or shanked. The only riot in the story actually takes place at another prison and isn’t discussed in detail. There’s no escape tunnels being dug through walls. Compared to fictional prisons like Oz or Shawshank...more

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Feb 14, 2008 Emily rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: novels, not-so-much

It was inevitable, I suppose, that Cheever write a prison novel (a compelling prospect, theoretically), but aside from some moments of wonderful prose, this story of an incarcerated heroin addict wallowing in the pleasurable humiliations of jailhouse eroticism came off as banal, even callow. Instead of orienting the novel firmly in its setting, the prison -- the titular Falconer -- feels more like a pretext than a context, and the characters never really emerge from their arid, rambling monologu...more

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Dec 12, 2007 Ian rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

A novel of bracing honesty, above all. Cheever's matter-of-fact reporting and his characters are both frank and entirely convincing. I've heard Falconer described as a tale of redemption, but frankly I found little evidence of transformation in Farragut himself. He is an egoïste in the latter part of his life, whose tastes and desires are fully formed and which he has no intention to change, though in Falconer he must learn to live with infrequent satisfaction. (His libido in particular is remi...more

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Jun 21, 2008 Mike rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 50-books-2008

I kind of wish that there were half star ratings on this site, because I feel emphatically 3 1/2 about this, but it seems a shame to stick it with a paltry 3.

This novel is distinctly American...which left me fairly hot or cold on it. Cheever uses very spare language that is occasionally flecked with powerful imagery to get across the story of a heroin addicted, college professor fratricide stuck in prison. It is certainly unsparing in its look into Farragut's (the main character) life which is w...more

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Mar 29, 2009 Tony rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction-mainstream

Cheever, John. FALCONER. (1977). ****. This was a re-read of a book I first read when it came out over thirty years ago. When I was reading the recent biography of Cheever by Blake Bailey, I was amazed at the praise heaped on this novel. I didn’t remember it as being all that great – at least not next to most of Cheever’s earlier work. So...I read it again. It’s not as good as his early work, though it is well written. I think all the hullabaloo was caused by the subject matter, which was very d...more

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Jun 09, 2013 Matchew McMatchew rated it 4 of 5 stars

I loved this book, I enjoyed reading it and wished it was longer. I think the setting is so unanimously understood, the grim gray cell and the leaky toilet. Being surrounded by fools and idiots, prison stories always seem to be told from the perspective of the 'one smart guy'. If the reader is in the right mood, feeling gloomy then you feel like you can slip right in the chow line with Farragut. I enjoyed his perspective of the world around him and perhaps would have enjoyed further character de...more

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Jul 04, 2012 Aprile rated it 5 of 5 stars

Sembra un romanzo autobiografico, preciso, chiaro, non vi sono esitazioni, si ha l’impressione che l’autore scriva di cose che conosce bene. Al tempo stesso il tono è distaccato, come se i fatti raccontati si riferissero a parecchi anni prima. Sembra che l’autore relazioni l’esperienza fatta da un amico che lo mette al corrente in un’unica seduta, in un intenso pomeriggio, senza dovizia di particolari ma badando solo all’essenziale. Sono giornate, mesi di vita in carcere di assassini, di uomini...more

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Jan 23, 2012 Insidebooks rated it 4 of 5 stars

This is not a particularly easy story to read. The tale of a man who kills his brother, is addicted to drugs and ends up in prison is not perhaps the ideal way to create a scenario and character that will lead to reader's hearts. But you find yourself on the side of Farragut despite all these things.

He describes how and why he became addicted to drugs - fed them during the war and then existence in a society that seems to be drugging the population in some form or other - and you find yourself h...more

This is not a particularly easy story to read. The tale of a man who kills his brother, is addicted to drugs and ends up in prison is not perhaps the ideal way to create a scenario and character that will lead to reader's hearts. But you find yourself on the side of Farragut despite all these things.

He describes how and why he became addicted to drugs - fed them during the war and then existence in a society that seems to be drugging the population in some form or other - and you find yourself half agreeing with him. Ironically it's prison that managed to make him clean after expensive clinics and therapists have failed to do the job.

There is also a well developed reveal of the murder with it clear that the relationship between the brothers is a strained one and the murder victim did to a degree ask for some sort of confrontation. That doesn't excuse the killing but it does allow you to side with Farragut when he describes it as exaggerated and an accident.

But that is all in the past and this story starts with the main character entering prison. The vivid description of the prison, the misery of confinement and the struggles to cope with the routine are all written brilliantly. As Farragut slips into a battle to keep his sanity and finds love in the arms of a prisoner who manages to escape the future looks bleak. His wife displays little chance of providing love and most of those prisoners and guards around him are struggling with their own emotional problems.

A riot at another prison ushers in a period of tension that provides Farragut with a chance to place himself in the heart of the community in F wing. He spends most of his time wandering through the memories of the past. Perhaps it is that process which encourages the sort of introspection that can lead to a life being turned around. Just as he breaks his dependence on drugs and methadone it is a more profound break with himself that prison provides.

Sure this is dark, sometimes brutal in its description of the world of the incarcerated and it has the powerr to shock. But what I will remember is the power of the writing, being taken on a journey that delivered from start to finish and an introduction to a writer I intend to read much more of.(less)

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Jan 16, 2012 Kirstie rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Fans of Cheever, those interested in prisoners

This is an interesting novel and about a subject that isn't written about too often..it takes place within the confines of a prison and there's a great deal of characterization of the prisoners and their stories as well as the philosophical thinking of the protagonist, who perhaps accidentally killed his brother and his addicted to methadone. There's some ideas of prisoner's rights as well as memories, a homosexual love affair, a clergy visit, and even a little of revolution but it leaves you wi...more This is an interesting novel and about a subject that isn't written about too often..it takes place within the confines of a prison and there's a great deal of characterization of the prisoners and their stories as well as the philosophical thinking of the protagonist, who perhaps accidentally killed his brother and his addicted to methadone. There's some ideas of prisoner's rights as well as memories, a homosexual love affair, a clergy visit, and even a little of revolution but it leaves you with a very strange idecipherable sort of feeling throughout, including the ending, which I feel could be taken either as a literal closure or a metaphorical one.

In any case, wither when it was written in the 70s or in our present time, there aren't many authors that are really exploring the humanity of prisoners including the qualities and the flaws as well as somewhat the prison guards themselves (though more on the prisoners). Cheever brings a certain quality to the novel in terms of the way they speak and their own life histories they seem to be desperate to tell, even to the point of bribes.

I think this novel is worth reading but even more so I feel it is worth pondering because we often think of criminals in a much different way and, though this novel is only a little over 200 pages, Cheever seems to take his time developing the storyline around characters that are too easily overlooked and forgotten, and again not often the focus of the vast majority of novels.

Memorable quotes:

pg. 38 "Loneliness taught the intransigent to love their cats as loneliness can change anything on earth."

pg. 51 Farragut, lying on his cot thinking of the morning and his possible death, thought that the dead, compared to the imprisoned, would have some advantages. The dead would at least have panoramic memories and regrets, while he, as a prisoner, found his memories of the shining world to be broken, intermittent and dependent on chance smells-grass, shoe leather, the odor of piped water in the showers. He possessed some memories, but they were eclipsed and indisposed. Waling in the morning, he cast wildly and desperately around for a word, a metaphor, a touch or smell that would grant him bearing...

pg. 80 "It was a very heavy and beautiful snow that, like some juxtaposition of gravity, seemed to set the mountain range free of the planet."

pg. 188 "I wouldn't be able to speak to you softly and with patience at this point if I did not believe that mathematics and geometry are a lying and a faulty analogy for the human disposition. When one finds in men's nature, as I do in yours, some convexity, it is a mistake to expect a corresponding concavity. Thiere is no such thing as an iscosceles man."

pg. 200 "...so I figure I must come into this life with the memries of some other life and so it stands taht I'll be going into something else and, you know what, Zeke, you know what, I can hadly wait to see what it's going to be like..."

pg. 207 "Had he raised his head, he would have seen a good deal of velocity and confusion as the clouds hurried past the face of a nearly full moon.."

pg. 208 "I got plenty of money. I been evicted because I'm a human being, that's why. (less)

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Dec 19, 2011 Shelly Sanders rated it 5 of 5 stars

Book review of Falconer by John Cheever

Published in 1975, Falconer is timeless with its story about a man struggling to retain his core while imprisoned for murder. This inmate--Farragut--is immediately seen as more educated than his fellow prisoners, more travelled, more introspective. But he is also a drug addict, which at times seems contrary to his character. As Farragut descends further into an inmate's life, though, we see that his flaw of being an addict has underlined his entire adult li...more

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Aug 16, 2011 Dan rated it 4 of 5 stars

While I enjoyed Cheever's writing (as a thing in itself), the subject matter of this particular work may be a bit "over-the-top" for more reserved / conservative / thematically sensitive readers (or somewhat age-inappropriate for folks less than 16-18). Cheever explores some interesting aspects of institutional imprisonment, drug abuse, psychology, homosexuality, and violence in such a way (and with such detail) it is difficult to imagine that Cheever is not speaking from personal experience......more

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May 12, 2009 Ben rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This book is both inventive and conventional; it would even make a pleasant beach read. John Cheever effectively manages both a broad lyrical range and--do I dare say it?--a plot! Yes, it can be done. Falconer wrestles out many of the sordid details of a heroin addict sentenced to prison for fratricide (the gay lover, the methadone, the riots, the cat killing) with a prosody that seems somehow unattainable. And, it's not by any stretch a victim's story. Where Cheever excels is where he is able t...more

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Jan 23, 2013 Poingu rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This is the third time I've read Falconer. The first was in college--I had just met John Cheever at a reading and the book had just been published and everyone, everyone knew it was a masterpiece, including me. If GoodReads had been around I would have given Falconer 5 stars.

I read it again fifteen years later, after everyone had forgotten about it. You could barely find it in bookstores--there was just room enough on the shelves for one Cheever book, by that time, and it was invariably his fat...more This is the third time I've read Falconer. The first was in college--I had just met John Cheever at a reading and the book had just been published and everyone, everyone knew it was a masterpiece, including me. If GoodReads had been around I would have given Falconer 5 stars.

I read it again fifteen years later, after everyone had forgotten about it. You could barely find it in bookstores--there was just room enough on the shelves for one Cheever book, by that time, and it was invariably his fat red Stories collection. On this second reading of Falconer I could make up my own mind and not be swayed by the crowd. And I was completely overcome by the narrative drive, the sheer beauty of the words, the mastery of sentence and paragraph and chapter, the swoon and swirl of the personal letters Farragut writes, the brief, beautiful love Farragut finds behind bars, the fantastic sweep of the closing paragraph. 12 stars, if I could.

And now another fifteen years has passed, and all these things are still true about Falconer--what beautiful, beautiful prose. But I find I can't get past the misogyny of the portrayal of Farragut's wife, or the pettiness of the authorial voice, or the ugliness of the judgments made of all humanity.

And I think: how could this man, this John Cheever, live with himself?

Of course, he did it badly. We know that now from his journals. He despaired of the world, he hated people, he hated himself. I'm happy at least that he had a book like "Oh What a Paradise it Seems" in him, and that he was able to publish this more hopeful and accepting outlook on life before he died. Falconer has none of this, though.

At this stage of my life I've learned, re-reading Falconer, that I'm no longer a nihilist, and no longer patient with other people's nihilism, however great the art that comes from it. I suddenly feel a strong need to go out and discover a book written in the last century that manages to be masterfully written while still being a hopeful book--not a sentimental book, not a trivial book, but a genuinely hopeful book. But maybe I'll fail. Maybe any great book has to be at least a little nihilistic. Tolstoy killed off any character who thought deeply, and let the buffoons live on. There is this deep idea about great literature, that any novel with happy characters must be vapid and sentimental. Ok. I'm on a quest to see if that is actually the case.(less)

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Jan 21, 2009 Kerry rated it 3 of 5 stars

This book is not, primarily, a prison novel. "Falconer" does touch on some common tropes of prison novels and, indeed, a number of parallels can be drawn between "Falconer" and Stephen King's "Rita Haysworth and Shawshank Redemption". Both main characters come from relatively moneyed pasts, they are not career criminals, and both end up with clerical jobs within the prison allowing them some privileges. There are, of course, differences. Farragut is guilty, importantly so, and has a severe heroi...more This book is not, primarily, a prison novel. "Falconer" does touch on some common tropes of prison novels and, indeed, a number of parallels can be drawn between "Falconer" and Stephen King's "Rita Haysworth and Shawshank Redemption". Both main characters come from relatively moneyed pasts, they are not career criminals, and both end up with clerical jobs within the prison allowing them some privileges. There are, of course, differences. Farragut is guilty, importantly so, and has a severe heroin addiction. While these details are consistent with a prison setting, the picture of prison never rings true. The prison seems merely a device to separate Farragut from his wife. In fact, the prison could be read as a metaphor for his marriage.

The book, however, is not about marriage either. Early in the book, there is a description of Farragut's wife:

She had an authenticated beauty. Several photographers had asked her to model, although her breasts, marvelous for nursing and love, were a little too big for that line of work..."You know," [Farragut's:] son had said, "I can't talk to Mummy when there's a mirror in the room. She's really balmy about her looks." Narcissus was a man and he couldn't make the switch, but she had, maybe twelve or fourteen times, stood in front of the full-length mirror in their bedroom and asked him, "Is there another woman of my age in this country who is as beautiful as I?" She had been naked, overwhelmingly so, and he had thought this an invitation, but when he touched her she said, "Stop fussing with my breasts. I'm beautiful."

This is prelude to an account of their courtship and a meeting of husband and wife at prison. At this meeting, she foreshadows the true subject of the novella: "I wouldn't want to be married to a homosexual, having already married a homicidal drug addict." Farragut, it turns out, would be considered by his wife and society to be a homosexual. Perhaps he is. He and, it seems, most of his fellow prisoners have or have had homosexual relationships.

The prison, in my reading, seems a metaphor, if a metaphor of anything, of the proverbial closet. Cheever seems to explore homosexuality, particularly among men who are, at least outside of prison, heterosexual men. Cheever fares better, I think, in this exploration. Some aspects of the novel, written in 1975, seem almost quaint by today's standards. Certainly in some areas and in some social sets, homosexual relationships are viewed with distaste and/or hostility, but times have happily changed in most of the U.S.

But Cheever does manage to create a portrait of the in-closet community at a particular time, his time. This was for me the most engaging and "real" aspect of the novella. I would not say Cheever misses with his many, explicit attempts to find universality, but they stand out. The examples can be mundane: "He waited for [his wife and son:] to emerge [from the visitor's room:] like a waiter in an American-plan hotel waiting for the dining room doors to open, like a lover, like a drought-ruined farmer waiting for rain, but without the sense of the universality of waiting."; "There was, Farragut thought, some universality to a full bladder." But they strike most honestly when touching upon sexuality as when Cheever describes a line of prisoners masturbating in "the Valley":

"The wall above the urinal was white tiling with a very limited power of reflection. You could make out the height and the complexion of the men on your left and your right and that was about all...There was some rightness in having the images of the lovers around them opaque. They were universal, they were phantoms, and any skin sores, or signs of cruelty, ugliness, stupidity or beauty, could not be seen. Farragut went here regularly after Jody [his lover:] was gone."

or when used to sketch a character:

Marshack...was very useful. He was indispensable at greasing machinery and splicing BX cables and he would be a courageous and fierce mercenary in some border skirmish if someone more sophisticated gave the order to attack. There would be some universal goodness in the man - he would give you a match for your cigarette and save you a seat at the movies - but there was no universality to his lack of intelligence. Marshack might respond to the sovereignty of love, but he could not master geometry and he should not be asked to. Farragut put him down as a killer.

And this, in the end, is Cheever's goal, I think. He manages to sketch the emotional life of closeted homosexuals, including portraying them as regular, if tortured, men, and also to reveal at least some universal aspects of mankind. He achieves this, I think. Not in a grand way, but adequately. This is not a great book, but it is a worthwhile book, addressing worthwhile subjects with enviable skill and sometimes piercing insight.

There is, after all, some redemption for Farragut and, through him, perhaps for mankind too.(less)

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May 24, 2012 Ian rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Falconer, John Cheever's best novel, is nothing less than a 20th-century classic, a story of human failure and redemption by one of the best fiction writers in American literature. Ezekiel Farragut arrives at Falconer prison, convicted of murdering his brother, Ebenezer. Farragut, a college professor, an intellectual, and a drug addict, has methodically cut himself off from the people in his life. He is selfish, nacissistic, aloof, egotistical in the extreme, and devoted to one thing: feeding hi...more

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Mar 08, 2013 Daniel G. rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction, classics, popular-penguins

The bookseller who showed me where this book was located said that it was a really good read.

College professor Ezekiel Farragut is sent to prison because he's a heroin addict and sexual adventurer. This novel tells of his time in prison before his trial.

The prose to this has a nice rhythm and it's one of those books that you need to read many times to fully appreciate. I can see it's good, and I like it, but I can't put my finger on why on this first reading. One thing I liked was that despite d...more

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Jun 16, 2013 Douglas rated it 4 of 5 stars

I'd been meaning to read this novel for literally a couple of decades and finally made it. I wish I could say it was great, but I thought it was only okay. I know Cheever taught a course in a prison for many years, but the prison here doesn't seem very realistic to me. (As someone who has been in a lot of prisons - as a attorney - I know there is a big difference between the people who get to leave a prison when their visit is over and those who are locked up in it.) Nor does the storyline seem...more

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Jun 27, 2010 Mark rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: time-100

Overcame a not-for-the-fainthearted description of the killing of some prison cats to finish this. That was early on and I almost stopped because I'm a cat person and that was just gruesome. Farragut is a convicted murderer, a drug addict and used-to-be professor. At first I thought maybe this would be for the prison what a novel like One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest is for an insane asylum, but the scope isn't quite the same. As well I wonder if it's a bit dated in its description of the prison...more

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Jan 25, 2012 Cherylann rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: mother-daughter-book-club

The Falconer, though not at all boring, was one of the most stagnant novels I have ever read. Because the subject matter is so controversial, it seems that Cheever thought his characters could have no depth or growth. The novel takes place within a Falconer prison (thus the title), and details the lives of unlikable protagonist, Farragut and various other underdeveloped prisoners. Though the reader can certainly not hope for a change in setting as the characters are imprisoned, he or she should...more

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Dec 19, 2009 Cassie rated it 3 of 5 stars

I did not quite grasp what's so special about this book, which embarrasses me, b/c it's supposed to be really amazing. It's VERY "manly" (written about a man's experience in prison) and explicit in some wonderfully shocking ways. It was my first read of this author, who is a Pulitzer prize winner. The writer's style is very contemporary and very different from what I'm used to, but it definitely grew on me. I'm now reading a collection of his short stories (which is what earned him the Pulitzer)...more

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Apr 23, 2013 Rick Bowen rated it 4 of 5 stars

Highly personal, atypical, strange, and satisfying. In Falconer, we have an author approaching old age "outting" himself in the narrative of a man's entering a gay relationship in prison. As a prison narrative the book is worthless. But obviously you have the construct of a prison-as-metaphor-for-society invoked in a broad way.

Sad that Cheever couldn't write about his own gayness in a more direct way but the time of its creation (early to mid 70s) argued against it. It's a good/great read when...more

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Sep 19, 2012 Jennifer C rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I agree with other reviewers in that this book contains zero ‘wow factor’. It's a gritty yet intellectual portrayal of a heroin addict incarcerated for murdering his brother who tells his tale in a matter-of-fact way. It seems that while the language is stark, the portrayal of Falconer prison itself is purposely kept rather gray. Farragut is in a semi-haze, jumping between supposed methadone highs and the kind of unreality that living in a jail cell might produce. The description of Farragut's w...more

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May 02, 2009 sam rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction-read

Some gorgeous prose, unsurprisingly -- maybe more gorgeous than Cheever's early work, since his use of a heroin addict for a protagonist gives the author greater license to indulge in gorgeous-prose passages. However, the fact remains that there's an uncomfortable elitist feel to the whole conceit on which the novel's based. Excellently humane without being remotely sentimental. Mercifully lean.

On my old copy of the book there's a quote from Saul Bellow calling the book "indispensable, if you ea...more

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Mar 15, 2013 Joe Krudys rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: literary-fiction

This was on Time's Top 100 List? I'm not sure I see why. It's not that the book wasn't good, it just wasn't great. Farragut seemed to be a drug addicted hollowed out soul going through the motions of surviving in prison, and nothing more, which was probably the point, but I felt both a lack of character depth and a plot, and I at least like to have one of those in a book. Aside from these flaws, it was still a book that kept my attention throughout, and I did like the writing, so I wouldn't say...more

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Oct 02, 2011 Stephen rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This is another one from the Time 100 list with a main character that really does not have any redeeming characteristics at all. Farragut is a junkie who murdered his brother and is sentenced to Falconer State Prison to while away his pathetic existence. His love affair with a fellow inmate is chronicled pretty graphically (not for the faint of heart). The only kind thing he does in the book is to nurse fellow inmate Chicken when it looks like the end is near. Somehow though, the writing is bett...more

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Feb 28, 2012 Damon Garr rated it 3 of 5 stars

How much context should we bring to a novel? Should we consider the writer's other works? Should the author's biography inform the reading of a particular novel?

I would like to read a book independent of its context. While the text may have an historical context that comes from without, what we should care about is within the text. Yet, when I read John Cheever's Falconer I couldn't help but consider the author's other work. The novel is so different from what I think of as John Cheever.

The nove...more

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Feb 02, 2011 Bryan rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 100-all-time-novels

My 22nd book from The List, is also the first book I've stolen. Well, maybe stolen is too strong of word. But I did 'borrow' it without permission from a tiny Newheart-esque Inn, near Markdale, Ontario.I was hoping theelement of danger associated with reading a sto--borrowed bookwould make for some exciting reading sessions,but no luck;not once did I look over my shoulder to see if the fuzz was on my tail. Falconer was yet another book I didn't really know anything about the story, but like Trop...more

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Jul 20, 2011 Jesse rated it 3 of 5 stars

A book about a prisoner named Zeke Farragut, Falconer is one of those antiquated "classics" in which the story is more centered around meandering thoughts and loose memories than any real description of the people and places that Farragut interacts with. The prose is exceptional however, but Cheever's style is much too poetic and rambling to connect with most people these days. Even though I called it antiquated, it was only written in 1977 which doesn't make it ancient or anything, but someone...more

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Sep 29, 2009 Fionnuala rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: twentieth-century

Beautiful prose (won a Pulitzer), but very dated. Like so many American novels of the 70s, this is a very enclosed book, drilling down into a flawed man's consciousness. No credible women characters (perhaps fair enough as is set in a prison), a glorification of drugs and alcohol, crazily unbelievable plot twists, lots of short-story style interludes. I could forgive all those flaws if there was a bit of verve to the book, but it is grimly Great American Novel Serious. Sorry, buster, but I've mo...more

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Feb 24, 2012 Randy rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

So here, then, is a John Cheever's great penal novel. Or should I say, penile novel. Yes, yes, the pun is too obvious to be anything but unfunny. But it's just shouting from the eaves to be thrust into the spotlight.

This is primarily because on cannot turn a page without finding cocks, balls, erections, ejaculations, peckers, dicks, tumescences, foreskins, pissings, and yes, at least one anal intrusion by a phallic object.

What would I expect, I suppose, from a prison novel. I've heard that song...more So here, then, is a John Cheever's great penal novel. Or should I say, penile novel. Yes, yes, the pun is too obvious to be anything but unfunny. But it's just shouting from the eaves to be thrust into the spotlight.

This is primarily because on cannot turn a page without finding cocks, balls, erections, ejaculations, peckers, dicks, tumescences, foreskins, pissings, and yes, at least one anal intrusion by a phallic object.

What would I expect, I suppose, from a prison novel. I've heard that song by Tool. I've seen Oz. I know what goes on there (or so I've heard).

But to be fair, Cheever writes of all of this stuff candidly, not pruriently. Even so, I can only assume that it was intended to be shocking and I suppose it was at the time of publication. Reading it now, however, these details, these celebrations of the male body and libido, come across as tired and sad. Reductive, even. And the allusions to Christianity don't help. As though the author intends to boil male experience down to God and cock and the spiritual turmoil that thus ensues. (In fact with Cheever this might have been the case...in more than one private musing he cursed his libido, his sexual predilections, and his penis.)

Those aspersions aside, Farragut is a complexly drawn and intriguing character. An addict and professor whose intellect and conscience are compromised by his desires (he both rationalizes and expounds upon his addiction and sexual recklessness). He's killed his brother and needless to say his family history is troubled. His marriage is superficial: a sham and a trainwreck. Also in the book's favor is the fact that it is written in Cheever's marvelously fluid prose which, unlike, say, Hemingway's chop-chop or Henry James's clockspring sentences, encourages the eye to glide across the page and seems to pour itself into the mind.

In summary, I felt quite a bit short of feeling "the ecstatic confidence of finishing a masterpiece" that Newsweek promises with its blurb on the empurpled back cover of the edition I possess. And the book has done little to dispel my predisposed disinterest in engaging the 'Great White Masters' of mid-to-late twentieth century American prose (Updike, Roth, Bellow). But I feel that I ought to at least confirm or change that opinion by basing it on some actual reading of some breadth of their work. So, on I plod.(less)

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About John Cheever

John Cheever was an American novelist and short story writer, sometimes called "the Chekhov of the suburbs" or "the Ovid of Ossining." His fiction is mostly set in the Upper East Side of Manhattan, the suburbs of Westchester, New York, and old New England villages based on various South Shore towns around Quincy, Massachusetts, where he was born.

His main themes include the duality of human nature:...more

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“Long ago when they first invented the atomic bomb people used to worry about its going off and killing everybody, but they didn't know that mankind has enough dynamite right in his guts to tear the fucking plant to pieces.” — 6 people liked it

“Chicken began to cry then or seemed to cry, to weep or seemed to weep, until they heard the sound of a grown man weeping, an old man who slept on a charred mattress, whose life savings in tattoos had faded to a tracery of ash, whose crotch hair was sparse and gray, whose flesh hung slack on his bones, whose only trespass on life was a flat guitar and a remembered and pitiful air of "I don't know where it is, sir, but I'll find it, sir," and whose name was known nowhere, nowhere in the far reaches of the earth or in the far reaches of his memory, where, when he talked to himself, he talked to himself as Chicken Number Two.” — 1 person liked it

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