Jordan's review
I Am Charlotte Simmons: A Novel by Tom Wolfe
The concept is bizarre: an elderly man visits a university and hangs around frat parties as research for his latest novel, which deals with a naive, pious girl's plunge from the bosom of her family into the sordid world of today's college. The result is pretty much as you'd expect: dialogue so embarrassing, with slang so overstated and overemphatically explained, that the whole thing was dated even when Wolfe was writing it. I'm reminded mostly of the "cool mom" from Mean Girls.
Wolfe's other virtues as a writer save this novel, though. Charlotte Simmons is a genuinely appealing character, and while the pages run rampant with Wolfe's less successful little sociological sketches, it's hard not to feel sympathy for Charlotte's plight as she confronts the challenges of co-ed bathrooms, general lechery, dumb jocks in classes, the cynicism of the educational system. Slowly growing debauched, Charlotte faces a turning-point midway through the novel in a scene that won Wol...more
Wolfe's other virtues as a writer save this novel, though. Charlotte Simmons is a genuinely appealing character, and while the pages run rampant with Wolfe's less successful little sociological sketches, it's hard not to feel sympathy for Charlotte's plight as she confronts the challenges of co-ed bathrooms, general lechery, dumb jocks in classes, the cynicism of the educational system. Slowly growing debauched, Charlotte faces a turning-point midway through the novel in a scene that won Wol...more
