Has anyone here read Tom Wolfe's book "I Am Charlotte Simmons"?

[Sugar Smack]

That was a gorgeous book. I must have read it six times. Tom Wolfe loves to go over the top, and I love to go with him. His main character, Charlotte, is from Sparta NC ("you've never heard of it"). Mountain territory. She's possessed with the sort of brilliance that gets her into the upscale college, Dupont, when she graduates. It's jammed with rich people, sarcastic, rich, foulmouthed, slutty people who shock innocent Charlotte at every turn.

Tom Wolfe took the class system here and shook it. He's SO good at describing the poor family of Charlotte and the rich kids on the campus. The story is fast moving, and there are several people in the book I think I might actually know.

I know this may belong in the Fiction forum, but has anyone here shared the joy of that book with me?

[applegrove]

1. I liked it. I'm not one for book reviews. But I was with that girl her whole

journey. I felt like I was there. It was almost creepy.

[Sugar Smack]

2. OMG, applegrove-

I think one of the scenes that horrified me the most since it was so accurate was the Sizzlin Skillet scene. Do you remember that? Tom Wolfe completely perfects the "low-rent" steak house scene, complete with huge plates of food and greasy-looking pictures of food on the walls. And a "buzzer".

Jojo was the hero. There he was at first, content to be a dumbshit forevermore. And stolid Charlotte, introducing him to the Life of the Mind.

I fell in love with his character. Especially when Jojo has Adam write his psper for him and his teacher is grilling him on the meaning of the words in his paper. Tom Wolfe is also amazingly good at writing women's thoughts.

Thank you for joining me. :D

[applegrove]

3. I read it less than a year ago and I cannot remember the characters or the details.

Such is my lot with reading novels.

[Sugar Smack]

7. I suppose it depends on how much the book absorbs you.

This one made me neglect the laundry for a day, not answer the phone, and overcook the pasta! What do you like? Novel-wise?

[applegrove]

13. I liked A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry. And Mordecai Richler. Ever Read Solomon Gursky Was Here?

I loved that so much I think I will read it again this year come to think of it.

[Withywindle]

4. I should read this!

Not usually a huge Tom Wolfe fan (I prefer Thomas :D) but I am from very near Sparta, NC, and went to a college kind of like that.

[Sugar Smack]

5. Withywindle, you would really love this, I think.

This is the most perfect book I think Tom Wolfe has ever come up with. You can feel the mood surges in the book. You can see Charlotte as being triumphant, then sucked to the lowest point of her life and every humiliation that comes with it, then back up again.

YOU would love this, being from near there. Sparta, I mean. There are a couple of points at which you have to be patient if you don't follow basketball. I follow football myself, but I really started paying attention in the book when Jojo, the basketball star, began looking for Charlotte.

She's so timid at first. Not with her basketball star, though. She quietly admonishes him as being "foolish" in class. He's famous on campus, but she's never heard of him or cares til they start talking in earnest. If someone doesn't shut me up, I'm going to type forever.

[sasquatch]

6. Sounds like something F. Scott Fitzgerald would write

[Sugar Smack]

8. The Great Gatsby is one of my favorite books.

And that was a dead-on assessment. I'm so glad we have Tom Wolfe in this generation. Have you ever seen or read Bonfire of the Vanities? Same exact principles abound in all his books. It's great.

[mitchum]

11. Wolfe is a reactionary conservative...

and always has been. That point of view is ever present in all of his work.
I enjoyed the gimmicky style he employed in his New Journalism, but found his novels to be one dimensional and populated with cardboard characters. I will still give "I Am Charlotte Simmons" a try, though...

[Sugar Smack]

20. Sure, he's most comfortable when he's over-the-top.

I think this is his very best work.:D

[mitchum]

21. No, he is a right wing elitist ass who likes to rail against intellectuals...

while extolling gleeful philistinism. And, of course, he is a hypocrite since he is a "man of letters" who while celebrating the exuberance of the rabble, he also disdains them.
When I was a Tonka! Hot Wheels! Spyder Bike! owning kid of 10 I first learned how to write (not in 10 EZY LESSONS!!!) by mimicking Wolfe's holy cow whiz bang go man go hot white neon flash amphetamine rushing torrent of words style-YESSIREE!!! So, I do have him to thank for introducing me to the concept of conscious stylistic choices, but he really is a conservative pig.

[sasquatch]

12. I think a George Orwell clone is more valuble than a F. Scott Fitzgerald clone

[Manifestor_of_Light]

24. "The Pimp Roll". "The Chow".

:rofl:

[DeepBlueC]

9. So fine in so many telling details...

I loved it. Some aspects of campus life never change but Wolfe has a great grasp of stuff that is new, and almost invariably dismaying, to me. You might also want to read Curtis Sittenfeld's Prep which is a brilliant first novel and covers similar territory.

[Sugar Smack]

19. That's what surprised me.

He did the POV of a young, naive college girl so well, I had to keep looking back at the picture of him in his signature white suit.

:bounce:

[DeepBlueC]

23. I read that he did actual research

...on campus. More than one I gather. I think the suggestion is that Dupont=Duke, although everyone on either side who is asked denies it. Yes,it's the big gun big athletic uni in general, of course, but I see Duke in the general profile, academic distinction, athletic prominence, location, the first two letters of the name ... A lot of what he learned about contemporary sexual mores was a big surprise to him, I remember reading. But for my money he got it all down and he got inside that girl's head good. I love Tom Wolfe, but, like you, as I read I kept saying to myself "I can't believe that HE wrote this ...I can't believe a GUY wrote it." This is very recognizable as girl-thought, girl reaction.

Have you read Prep? You will like that too.

[mitchum]

10. Sounds like Wolfe may have finally learned how to create rounded characters

[alphafemale]

14. I have an autographed copy of that.

He was doing a talk here in Savannah.

I've not read it though.

I like getting autographed copies of books by well known authors.

Just a quirky hobby.

[Sugar Smack]

18. Aw geeze, read it wouldya?

Otherwise it's totally going to waste. If you want the real value of his sig, then please read his words. *envy, envy*

:D You'll truly not be sorry.

[Iris]

15. I was just trying to remember the name of this book!

Because I want to read it!

Thanks!

[Sugar Smack]

16. OMG! This book has pages I want to go back to

and re-read when I'm feeling low. The word "unstoppable" comes to mind with three of the characters. Tom Wolfe does the "low point" and the "high point" so well. I love his way with description: hunger, humilliation, triumph.

I did,'t like "A Man in Full" as much. I thought he copped out a little there at the end, but "Bonfire of the Vanities" was AWESOME.

[Iris]

17. I'm sold.

Going to put it on reserve at my library's website right now...

[WildEyedLiberal]

22. I read the two excerpts published in Rolling Stone

I didn't like what I read at all. I'm not from the mountains but I am from a small rural farm town and Wolfe's characterization of working class rural people really got under my skin in a bad way. It was a very condescending and patronizing portrayal. Not to mention that his depiction of life at college (I go to a big state university, not exactly like the university in the novel but close enough) was ridiculous - sure crazy shit happens here but the everything I read was like a gross caricature of reality.