The Bonfire of the Vanities : Book

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1) Hardcover Book The Bonfire of the Vanities by . The Bonfire of the Vanities is the second Tom Wolfe book that I have read. The first was I Am Charlotte Simmons, which although flawed, I enjoyed. Still, this book (along with two other Wolfe titles) sat on my shelf for quite a while, intimidating me due to its thickness, as I like books that I can read through quickly. When I finally began reading this one, I found that in spite of its length, I was able to proceed quickly.

The Bonfire of the Vanities is the story of three men. Sherman McCoy is a high-salaried bond trader living with his wife and daughter in a Park Avenue apartment. In spite of his job and status, he finds himself worrying about money as it flows out as quickly as it comes in. His obsession is being a "Master of the Universe." Sherman is also romantically involved with Maria Ruskin, the young wife of an elderly businessman.

Larry Kramer is an assistant district attorney working in the Bronx. He also lives his wife and young child, but his conditions are much different. His tiny apartment would fit into McCoy´s living room. Kramer experiences a combination of envy and disdain toward other lawyers with high-paying jobs at big firms, as he would like their salaries, but feels he is on the moral high road as he helps serve the public.

Finally, there is Peter Fallow, an alcoholic British journalist for a tabloid. Fallow has been down on his luck, and his main goal each day is to find ways to get free meals. Fallow tries to dupe his boss into thinking he is being productive, and also desires a lifestyle beyond his means.

The thread that ties the three characters together begins when McCoy and his mistress are involved in an accident where he may have hit someone while driving in the Bronx at night. He is conflicted over whether to report it, while his mistress says to forget about it as they don´t know if anything actually happened. It turns out that they hit a young black man from the projects who was living a clean lifestyle, leaving him in a coma. Community leaders put pressure on the police and legal system to go after the perpetrator. Fallow is the reporter who breaks the story, while Kramer is the ADA in charge of prosecuting the case. When witnesses lead the investigation back to McCoy, the case becomes about race and social class.

In telling this story, the author presents a vivid description of New York during the 1980´s. Having never been there, I can´t judge whether this description is accurate, but it added a lot to the story. Also, the characters are very well fleshed out. Each has his own flaws and virtues, which evolve over time. The arrogant McCoy and the idealistic Kramer from the beginning are definitely depicted differently at the conclusion.

Overall, this was a well-written novel, and I will be dusting off and reading A Man in Full and The Right Stuff (eventually).¤

2) Hardcover Book The Bonfire of the Vanities by . I picked this book up on the recommendation of strangers who said that it was one of those must read American novels. I´m always leery of these recommendations as they Ayn Rand usually appears on them and as a someone once told me "Friends don´t let friends read Ayn Rand". This was a surprisingly good book, I can´t say how accurately it portrays New York City in the late 80´s early 90´s but it feels real, and the tensions and issues it deals with (race/class inequalities, the purpose of wealth) are ones we´ve yet to overcome or even recognize they need to be dealt with... Highly recommended.¤

3) Hardcover Book The Bonfire of the Vanities by . Although I have enjoyed some of Tom Wolfe´s early nonfiction work, Bonfire languished on my shelf, unread, for several years. For some reason, I had dry and boring in mind for this book, which turn out patently untrue.

To the reader who expects a true picture of gritty life in a big city, or a real picture of relations between groups of people, as other reviewers have called this, look elsewhere! Bonfire is satire...it is exaggeration...it is a farce.

Great truths, however, often lie in humor. Wolfe has created a world where the reader manages to despise just about every character. You may be at least indifferent to the cops, or Fitzgibbon, the assistant DA who still seems to have his head on straight, but these characters just provide enough temperance to remind you how you hate everyone else.

Wolfe´s use of the English language is something like Shakespeare meets tabloid journalist, and his verbiage never fails to trigger an emotion, or two, often laughter and anger or despair at the same time.

I often found I could not put the book down, but unfortunately,it seemed at the moments of highest suspense, the wordiness begins to drag, slowing the pace to a crawl, when you´d most like to fly.¤

4) Hardcover Book The Bonfire of the Vanities by . Great Book. Very enjoyable. The writing is probably better than the story. There are sentences in this book which I think are probably the finest ever written. An absolute treat.¤

5) Hardcover Book The Bonfire of the Vanities by . Tom Wolfe captures the essence of big-city racial and class conflict, plus greed, ambition, and self-serving hypocrites. His story concerns high-living banker Sherman McCoy, whose accidental exit from the New York freeway into the crime-plagued South Bronx leads to his mistress running over a young black man (who may have been looking to rob McCoy). Enter a questionable black leader, an unscrupulous vote-seeking district attorney, and a sleazy tabloid reporter, each of whom seeks to manipulate and play off events for their own aggrandizement. The story has few admirable characters at any level, not in the Park Avenue mansions, the courts, nor the tough streets. Equally lacking are social codes of decency and honesty. The story covers New York in the mid-1980´s but one senses it applies today as well.

Wolfe provides a powerful tale, one with some parallels to the Tawana Brawley hoax that occurred not long after this book arrived. The book drags a bit in a couple places (thus four stars and not five), but Wolfe provides a powerful message.¤

Vintage Tom Wolfe, the #1 bestseller that will forever define late-twentieth-century New York style. "No one has portrayed New York Society this accurately and devastatingly since Edith Wharton" (The National Review)

7) Hardcover Book The Bonfire of the Vanities by . After Tom Wolfe defined the ´60s in The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test and Radical Chic and Mau-Mauing the Flak Catchers and the cultural U-turn at the turn of the ´80s in The Right Stuff, nobody thought he could ever top himself again. In 1987, when The Bonfire of the Vanities arrived, the literati called Wolfe an "aging enfant terrible."

He wasn´t aging; he was growing up. Bonfire´s pyrotechnic satire of 1980s New York wasn´t just Wolfe´s best book, it was the best bestselling fiction debut of the decade, a miraculously realistic study of an unbelievably status-mad society, from the fiery combatants of the South Bronx to the bubbling scum at the top of Wall Street. Sherman McCoy, a farcically arrogant investment banker (dubbed a "Master of the Universe," Wolfe´s brilliant metaphorical co-opting of a then-important toy for boys), hits a black guy in the Bronx with his Mercedes and runs--right into a nightmare peopled by vicious mistresses, thin wives like "social x-rays," slime-bag politicos, tabloid hacks, and Dantesque denizens of the "justice" system. If the Coen and Marx brothers together dramatized The Great Gatsby, Wolfe´s Bonfire would probably be funnier. Many think his second novel, A Man in Full, is deeper, but Bonfire will never die down.

You might find it interesting to compare the film The Bonfire of the Vanities, a fascinating calamity perpetrated by the geniuses Brian De Palma and Tom Hanks, with The Right Stuff, one of the very best films of the ´80s. --Tim Appelo¤

The Bonfire of the Vanities

Author - Tom Wolfe ... [Goo?] [Posters]

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