Please join the Lost &\; Found book gro up to discuss William Lindsay Gresham's peerless noir Nightmare Alley on 2 8 October 2021. Perhaps best remembered as a beautifully-made Tyrone Power film from 1947\, the novel pushes boundaries that Hollywood\, during that period\, couldn't begin to touch. It begins with an extraordinary descrip tion of a carnival-show geek&mdash\;alcoholic and abject and the object of the voyeuristic crowd&rsquo\;s gleeful disgust and derision&mdash\;going about his work at a county fair. Young Stan Carlisle is working as a carny \, and he wonders how a man could fall so low. There&rsquo\;s no way in he ll\, he vows\, that anything like that will ever happen to him.
\nAn d since Stan is clever and ambitious and not without a useful streak of ru thlessness\, soon enough he&rsquo\;s going places. Onstage he plays the me ntalist with an alluring assistant (before long his harried wife)\, then h e graduates to full-blown spiritualist\, catering to the needs of the rich and gullible in their well-upholstered homes. It looks like the world is Stan&rsquo\;s for the taking. At least for now.
\nThere is nothing q uite like this novel in the American canon. It was chosen by the Library o f America for its "American Noir: 11 Classic Crime Novels of the 30s\, 40s and 50s. A remake of the film\, directed by Academy Award-winner Guillerm o del Toro and starring Bradley Cooper\, will be released on 17 December 2 021.
\n"Written in 1946 and just reissued\, \;Nightmare \;Al ley \;was adapted into one of the most scabrous films of the 1940s. It 's a grifter story\, a carny story\, whose main character is Stan Carlisle \, a handsome con artist/fake mind reader who slowly works his way down th e food chain until there's nothing left for him except the job of circus g eek. It's a novel in which no ray of light ever penetrates. The novel is a fascinating curio of undoubtedly justified self-loathing&mdash\;Gresham's second wife\, the poet Joy Davidman\, left him for C. S. Lewis. Gresham c ommitted suicide in 1962. The new edition has a preface by Nick Tosches\, who is working on a biography of Gresham. Certainly one of the most valuab le reissues of the year." &mdash\;The Palm Beach Post
\n"For contemp orary audiences who have never strolled through sawdust and tinsel\, the c arnival chapters of \;Nightmare Alley \;offer an unnerving slice o f seedy Americana." &mdash\;The Baltimore Sun
\n"The &lsquo\;nightma re&rsquo\; of the title rings true\, for this delirious and unstoppable no vel . . . inverts the American dream. The plot turns the Horatio Alger myt h on its head and the psychology leans on Freud\, but the torment\, the pe rvading sense that the human creature lives in a trap he or she is doomed never to escape\, comes from the heart and mind of the author. Never was n oir more autobiographical than here. . . . \;Nightmare Alley \;rem ains a masterpiece\, not only due to its driving narrative power\, but bec ause it&rsquo\;s underpinned by the premise that the human animal is alone \, helpless in the face of destiny\, stumbling in the dark\, down the nigh tmare alley toward the inevitable wall of death at the end. Yet we can&rsq uo\;t stop ourselves hoping\, and fearing\, that there might be something beyond that wall. The message of this disquieting book couldn&rsquo\;t be more human\, yet that message is metaphysical rather than moral." &mdash\; Los Angeles Times
\n&ldquo\;Nightmare Alley \;combines the creep y world of Tod Browning's movie &lsquo\;Freaks&rsquo\; with the relentless cynicism of a Jim Thompson novel.&rdquo\; &mdash\;Time
\n&ldquo\;Fo r fans of vaudeville and magic\, the book is a treasure trove of trade sec rets.&rdquo\; &mdash\;Walter Kirn
\nWe will meet upstairs near the A dult workroom to discuss this brilliant portrait of greed\; it's perfect f or fans of both the Golden Age of American noir and All Hallow's Eve! If y ou have any questions\, contact me at glowry@oneallibrary.org \;or leave me a voicemail at (205) 44 5-1147. I look forward to seeing you!
\nhttps://emmetoneal.libnet.info/ event/5617842 URL;VALUE=URI:https://emmetoneal.libnet.info/event/5617842 ATTACH:https://static.libnet.info/images/events/emmetoneal/91Zgy7oKyqL.jpg END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR