Define Of Books Humboldt's Gift

Title:Humboldt's Gift
Author:Saul Bellow
Book Format:Paperback
Book Edition:Deluxe Edition
Pages:Pages: 487 pages
Published:June 1st 1996 by Penguin Classics (first published 1975)
Categories:Fiction. Classics. Literature
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Humboldt's Gift Paperback | Pages: 487 pages
Rating: 3.86 | 8059 Users | 541 Reviews

Description In Favor Of Books Humboldt's Gift

The novel, for which Bellow won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1976, is a self-described "comic book about death," whose title character is modeled on the self-destructive lyric poet Delmore Schwartz. Charlie Citrine, an intellectual, middle-aged author of award-winning biographies and plays, contemplates two significant figures and philosophies in his life: Von Humboldt Fleisher, a dead poet who had been his mentor, and Rinaldo Cantabile, a very-much-alive minor mafioso who has been the bane of Humboldt's existence. Humboldt had taught Charlie that art is powerful and that one should be true to one's own creative spirit. Rinaldo, Charlie's self-appointed financial adviser, has always urged Charlie to use his art to turn a profit. At the novel's end, Charlie has managed to set his own course.

Be Specific About Books Conducive To Humboldt's Gift

Original Title: Humboldt's Gift
ISBN: 0140189440 (ISBN13: 9780140189445)
Edition Language: English
Characters: Charlie Citrine, Von Humboldt Fleisher, Renata Koffritz, Rinaldo Cantabile, Pierre Thaxter, Denise Citrine, Demmie Vonghel
Setting: Chicago, Illinois(United States) New York City, New York(United States)
Literary Awards: Pulitzer Prize for Fiction (1976), National Book Award Finalist for Fiction (1976), Society of Midland Authors Award for Adult Fiction (1976)


Rating Of Books Humboldt's Gift
Ratings: 3.86 From 8059 Users | 541 Reviews

Column Of Books Humboldt's Gift
I keep getting drawn back to Saul Bellows novels like a crazy-ass bee to a barren flower. I must love the disappointment, the confusion, the frustration. Im a literature masochist. Bellow sees my eagerness, my dog-like enthusiasm, beckons me in closer...and then smacks me on the nose. His novels are never truly satisfying; they almost enrage me. How could a man be so talented, such a great writer, and yet churn out such flawed books? In truth, I dont know how to review Humbodts Gift. It defeats

This novel is divided into sections of uneven length, each section probably best described as a chapter, unnumbered. The narrative is in the first person, told by the writer Charlie Citrine, the erstwhile friend and protégé of Von Humboldt Fleisher, a poet whose greatest fame occurred in the Thirties, after which the friendship shattered as Humboldts reputation declined and Charlies rose. The syntax, at the beginning, is simple declarative sentences, but it becomes far more florid during long

Last night I dreamt that Saul Bellow was still alive, and that I met him. (Met him at the Chicago branch of something called the Hitler-Piedmont Bank--I know, I know, it was a dream, so it had to be a little fucked up.) I started to gush, but of all the phrases, characters and scenes of his that I admire, the only thing I praised was his description, in this novel, of Humboldt's mud-bespattered station wagon as looking like "a Flanders staff-car."

What a shallow author. He longs for a world that never was and is a wanna be for the ways things aren't. The story is decent enough but the author really wrote the book to muse philosophically on the nature of life and to offer philosophical insights on the nature of mortality and offer a refutation to the Myth of Sisyphus. This is where he fails miserably. A good author should be able to dazzle you with his wit while baffling you with his bullshit. This author (or his characters) are incredibly

The labyrinthine mental processes of an exceptional man of letters-- challenging, uneven, extremely self conscious & in the end, of course, Literary."I have snoozed through many a crisis (while millions died)" laments our Hero. Our overthinking, overcompensating, overwhelming hero. He's a regular Danish prince-- indeed most of his life is seen through a Shakespearean filter that has more to do with complications than tragedy or romance.There are amazing sentences and a wholly exuberant prose

It's interesting how passionate I get when I dislike a book. Maybe I feel ripped off? My expectations were high and that no doubt plays into it.The setup is interesting and has great potential. A man is on a quest to make sense of his life in a world that's lost its way. The theme: Culture, the arts, advanced learning and thinking, (the only raisons-d'être for man's existence don't you know) are being quashed by modern society and its trappings. From the get-go, there are quotes or mention of

I mostly loved this novel, but there were spots of tedium here and there. The novel starts out a bit slow-to-read, but as it gets into the action of the plot, the pace picks up. The story takes place over a short span of time, but the narrator Charlie Citrine frequently recollects his past, giving temporal depth to the story. The subject of much of his remembrance is his former mentor, Humboldt Fleisher, now deceased. Their relationship was rocky, ended badly, and Charlie seems to be working