Too Far To Walk

by John Hersey

"John Hersey probes deeply, but with rich humor, into the aimlessness, boredom, and rebellion of a group of undergraduates in a New England college"

Genres: Fiction, Novels

Hardcover

First published January 1, 1966

About the author

John Richard Hersey, a Pulitzer Prize-winning American writer, earliest practiced the "new journalism," which fuses storytelling devices of the novel with nonfiction reportage. A 36-member panel under the aegis of journalism department of New York University adjudged account of Hersey of the aftermath of the atomic bomb, dropped on Hiroshima, Japan, as the finest piece of journalism of the 20th century.

Reviews

[Howard]

Tis the season to be jolly. Therefore, I am abandoning this book. If Jonathan Franzen had been writing during the '6o's, he might have written this book about shallow young people with faux intellectual pretensions. They are his kind of people.

I have read many of Hersey's novels and have enjoyed and admired most of them, but "Too Far to Walk" is too dull to read. I think I will take a walk instead, but not too far.

[Printable Tire · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the book that made me want to start reading again. I read it junior year of college when I was feeling sort of apathetic about school and life in general and soon afterwards I became very active and had the best year of my life (up until now). I remember going on one of my great long walks while or soon after reading it. My paperback edition had a portrait of the characters done by that artist who often does portrait covers for paperbacks and whose work I greatly admire.

I think Been Down So Long It Looks Like Up to Me would've done the trick to kick me into shape back then too, but I didn't read that book until later, when it was too late for it to do me any good.

For these reasons, this book has always been a favorite of mine.

[Andrew · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have been praising a number of John Hersey novels, with an exception of The Child Buyer. Unfortunately, Too Far to Walk does not live up to the praise I have given many of Hersey's other works.

It seems to be a novel about the apathy (or spoildness) of young people. They have it all, yet are bored and try drugs, and can't be motivated, etc. And it could have been OK if it stayed that route. But Hersey adds in a distracting and strange supernatural element to this, that is so discordant with any social commentary, that it left me distracted, annoyed and badly surprised.

The novel focuses on an middle-upper class student, John Fist, at a good eastern university. And he is bored and finds the sanctimonious taint to the staff exceedingly dull.

Now first off, Hersey's portrayal of college students seems WAY off. So much so that I would call it BS. But John Fist is his caricature of this type of student. And he gets tempted to try life a different way. No, he does not do drugs, or rebel by becoming a hippie (this book was written first published in '66) or go for free love.
No, John Fist is tempted by another student that is really Satan in disguise, gets him to sign a contract with him, and then, pretty much, nothing happens except John Fist does stupid things.

Really? That is what this book is? Look, if Hersey did not like the attitudes of young people in that age, that is fine, write a socially relevant novel. But this is not that novel. If he wants to write a supernatural novel about dealing with temptation, write it, but this is not that novel either. It is an extremely bad synthesis of the two, and it just does not work.

There are many very fine works by John Hersey...this is not one of them.

[Meg · Rating 1 out of 5]

There are occasionally those books which you finish and then really wonder why you bothered. This would be one of those. It left me feeling sort of sick and blech afterwards, and sort of wishing I had never touched it. Being a little bummed out after reading something like Hiroshima is understandable. But there's no reason to depress yourself over a book about one sort of lame guy's fairly average experiences in college. Unfortunately, Hersey manages to make them not only depressing but also pretty creepy. Ack. I wish I had steered clear of it all.

[Mark Krajnak · Rating 2 out of 5]

Kind of happy I stuck with it as it seems many didn't, but this was pretty disappointing. Then again, I picked this up on the street (literally - someone had books in a box that said Free on it) so I didn't lose anything. And gained some knowledge via research on an author I may try again.

[Alan]

A prescient novel about drugs. What happens when it's just too far to walk to get to class. Fictionalized account of effect of drugs and the devil on a student

[Joanne · Rating 2 out of 5]

Maybe it was the annoying stylistic approach to writing dialogue but this one got on my nerves.

[Dileri · Rating 1 out of 5]

Giving up on this. Pretty preposterous. It was annoying me stylistically and then the author throws the stupid Faustian curve in and just puts me off completely.

[Trish Nguyen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Writing wise, the descriptions are good. Hersey's writing is beautiful. My only gripe is all the references to old literature. Some of it I understand, but most of it I don't so he's just listing random things to me. I mean LISTING. There are times when he's describing a scene or a feeling and I'm like wow that's such a pretty way of saying that and there are other times where I'm like okay I get it. He has so many lists and references that I felt myself getting lost in them and forgetting what Hersey was originally talking about.

I had a pretty hard time following the plot no cap. So student gets bored, makes a deal w the devil, dates a (underage?) girl once, loses virginity to a prostitute, robs his friend's house, does acid, goes to war, ends up at the hospital, does something else completely unrelated that I forgot, ends up at the alter of a succubus with his mother who gets raped, and ends up at college again? I feel like the sequence immediately after LSD and before waking up at school again may have been the hallucination dream sequence as a result of the LSD but it was just so random and abrupt. Like so much fucking happens and when the next chapter starts at a completely different scenario I'm like wait what? No one online ever talks about the sequence of events after the lsd so I can't read other people's insight on it. Like what does John learn from the sequence other than to appreciate the life he has, regardless of the monotony? Bad trip=at least life isnt as bad, Is that it? Hersey takes us through this Rollercoaster of events and then it just ends bc John wakes up. Also why does he do all the wack shit leading up to the LSD? Even outside of the dream sequence, I felt like I couldn't keep up w all the scenario changes and what john was getting himself into and why he was doing it. It seems a bit dramatic for someone who wants to feel something, and I wanna believe that I can draw something more from this book.

There were some parts that were funny and some parts that were simply enjoyable. Overall tho, I was very confused.

[Michael Stutzer · Rating 2 out of 5]

Journalist/Novelist John Hersey is perhaps best known for his Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, “A Bell for Adano” published in 1944. The public was ready for this WW II-time novel depicting a kindly American military governor in occupied coastal Italy. By 1966, the Vietnam War had changed the younger public’s view of the US military and their own near-term relationship to it. This is the backdrop for Hersey’s short novel, “Too Far To Walk”, which surely is not Too Long To Read.

The novel follows the existence of John Fist, a sophomore enrolled as a “legacy” at a small 4-year liberal arts college. He is already bored with the curriculum and the rest of college life, in search of meaning. Unlike some of the faculty and students who find that meaning in social protest, he seems most riled about the college’s demand that he soon declare a Major.

Nowadays a student like him would be referred to the college’s student counseling bureaucracy. Instead young Fist discovers that a dorm buddy is The Devil Incarnate. He cuts a deal, hoping to make his life more exciting and meaningful in return for future de-facto payments specified in the fine print. Being a typical liberal arts student, he skips the fine print – perhaps he hoped to purchase the Cliff’s Note at the school bookstore.

The final section of the book chronicles The Devil’s actions intended to keep his end of the bargain. These include inducing John to burglarize the tenement of a downtrodden Townie, an LSD trip (how quaint that seems now), and the opportunity to get arrested in a semi-violent student protest against the requirement to declare a Major. The only semi-violent protest that would result in arrests now would be a protest against a requirement to take critical race theory. I was disappointed that this section of the book didn’t do more to justify the time I spent reading what came before it.

[Mike Bahl · Rating 2 out of 5]

There are so many references to literature and cultural moments in time here that were completely lost on me. Like written in a way where the point of the sentence was indiscernible without knowing the reference. Like that Family Guy style of reference where it's just, "this is a thing," but in a seemingly smart way? I don't know, I didn't understand any of them.

This is in the Rosemary's Baby deal with the devil style that was a thing at the time, so yes, it's about disaffected youth, but with a little satanic panic thrown in, kind of. Like a modern (to the time) update on The Catcher in the Rye. Probably. Been a while since I've read that one.

I don't have any big feelings about most of this book, other than the explanation for Fist's disillusionment felt forced. Disillusionment and depression just kinda happen. I think it would've been fine to just stop going to class without trying to explain it. I also don't really know what Fist wants. I don't think he does either though.

My biggest thing is the ending. So, spoiler alert I guess. There's like several sections of the lives John could lead? Maybe? I don't know. Because none of them seem exactly rooted in reality either. They're too long and intricate to just be acid trip visions, and we never see John come out of the trip either. Kinda just felt like the author saying fuck it and just deciding to end the book now. This was the only thing that was truly frustrating beyond repair. But it was a pretty big thing.

[Wilma · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book sucked! It was slow and had a bunch of words I didn't know. And Latin and French. Guy in college who needs to get his shit together. makes a deal with the Devil and does LSD.

Don't waste your time.

[James Charles · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wow. What a mess kids were in the 60's; although......

[Andrea · Rating 2 out of 5]

Strange...

[Joseph · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not one of his best works.

[Mary · Rating 1 out of 5]

Boring, hard to follow.

[pjr8888 · Rating 4 out of 5]

i read this when i was a junior in college, a very conservative, closed cCatholic seminary college. i remember the "aimlessness" seemedenticing.... as well as the other "adventures" experiences narrated here.
i wonder if going back now i would find it as invigorating. i hope not, but was grateful for it at the time.

[Don · Rating 1 out of 5]

I didn't finish the book. I couldn't relate, at my age, to the subject, college boys.

[Symone Thomas · Rating 3 out of 5]

1960's-era Faust highlighting the turn of a cultural shift of which modern America is the product (or, rather, in the midst of?)

[Lisa · Rating 2 out of 5]

I like Hersey a lot but this one didn't resonate with me. College student feeling his oats and then picking a path. Lots of temptations and tasting the world.