Entry 5.2: "Early Autumn," by Louis Bromfield (1927)

Five novels down, and I think I'm just starting to attain the level of commitment necessary to finish this project. As my brother in arms, Joshua, said to me today, "This Pulitzer project is a true test of endurance my friend." Amen to that. I didn't really suppose that this project would be particularly easy, but I also didn't think it would be this difficult.

I mean—I am a reader. For all intents and purposes, I am a reader by trade. I read my way through childhood and high school to keep me occupied, I read my way through college in order to graduate and my goal has been to make reading my profession. That being said, I guess I kind of assumed that this project wouldn't be such a chore. What I didn't take into account, however, was that there would be some books along this journey that I really don't have any interest in at all. Welty's The Optimist's Daughter and Tarkington's The Magnificent Ambersons, as has been well documented, were dreadful bores and, to be entirely forthcoming, so was my most recent reading, Louis Bromfield's Early Autumn.
Now, even though I wasn't very taken by this book, I wouldn't ever say, "It's not a good book," because, in all honesty, it is a good book. It's very well written and the subject matter is of great interest. It's just that I had a difficult time getting into it.

For one thing, most of the characters in the book were entirely one-dimensional. There were a couple of exceptions of course, like Olivia, Michael O'Hara and, eventually, John Pentland, but the others were so drab and dull. Even in their most exciting moments, I wasn't particularly enthralled with them. This book reminded me of something John Lennon once said about the Bible: "Jesus was all right, but his disciples were thick and ordinary. It's them twisting it that ruins it for me." It was the other characters in this book that I think made Olivia so intriguing—if it wasn't for their mediocrity and lack of character development, Olivia probably wouldn't have been so interesting. It really seemed as though she was the only one throughout the entire book that had any real conflicts about anything; everyone else had a set opinion or feeling about such and such and that's the way they were throughout the entire book despite whatever situation they were in. Aunt Cassie was shallow and concerned with image; Sabina was vindictive and completely against the establishment the wealthy had created; Sybil was the dreamer that longed to see the world; Jean de Cyon was the young, hopeless romantic Frenchman and these personality traits defined the characters throughout the entire book. They were completely one-dimensional.

And, of course, with Sabine and Sybil, I quite liked their personalities. But one worthwhile quality does not a good character make.
And, just like The Magnificent Ambersons, Early Autumn was really nothing more than a long-winded narrative about High Society. I commented to Josh yesterday, while I was still trudging through Chapter 7, "With all this shit, there has to be a story here somewhere." Throughout the first seven or eight chapters, I must confess, I really didn't know what was going on. Maybe I was reading through too quickly, maybe I was just reading for the sake of reading and not really getting the full scope of what Bromfield was trying to convey, or maybe I was too distracted by the density of the text, but I really didn't see any overarching plot in the book. There were a lot of subplots going on—I was able to pick those out pretty easily: a couple of deaths, a love scandal, an affair or two, family rivalries, etc., etc.. It almost seemed as though the subplots were actually driving the story. I suppose one could say that the plot of the story was Olivia's eventual disenfranchisement with High Society, but, to me, were this any other book written by any other author, this would seem more like a subplot.

Fellow readers, help me out on this one: is there something blatantly obvious that I'm missing or is Bromfield just another case of a fantastic writer suffering from a bad story?
I think I'm going to take a break from the High Society books for a while, and I'm definitely going to take a break from Modernist books—how is it that what was once my favorite literary movement now seems such a drag?

For whatever reason, I'm feeling like I should read either William Kennedy's Ironweed or N. Scott Momaday's House Made of Dawn next. I guess all of you will find out which direction I decide to go in my next update!