I am Charlotte Simmons

[Sancho]

Would anyone like to discuss Tom Wolfe’s new novel? I’ve just completed I am Charlotte Simmons, and as with just about everything else Tom Wolfe has written, I enjoyed it immensely.

What amazes me about Tom Wolfe is his uncanny ability to access, what to the rest of us are, “closed societies.” He got inside of the Hippie culture in Electric Cool-aide Acid Test, and the Fighter/Test Pilot culture in The Right Stuff, and the Investment Banker culture in Bonfire of the Vanities; now, with Charlotte Simmons, he’s waded into twenty first century college life.

I’m personally fairly far removed from the college scene (I refuse to admit to anyone how far) and anyway I was a lowly engineering geek when I was there. There, being Austin, Texas. As far removed as I am…Tom Wolfe is even more so. Can a seventy-something year-old man write convincingly from the perspective of an eighteen year-old female ivy league prodigy?

I think that the people on this forum are better suited to answer this question than any nationally syndicated book review mag. I wish that ‘Em was still around…I miss her. Anyhow, so many of you guys are still in, about to go, or recent grad’s of college. And that being the case, if anyone can make a critical assessment of Wolfe’s new novel – it be you.

[mister_noel_y2k]

i started a thread like this not too long ago and got no responses, good to see that some one else is enjoying the magic of wolfe! at the moment im reading bonfire of the vanities having finished a man in full.

yeah i have to say that charlotte simmons is pretty much spot on in terms of drinking/drugs/sex culture as im a recently departed third year uni dude. the sex scenes were kind of silly though didn't you think? nonetheless i enjoyed charlotte's eventual descent from genius to material girl and jojo, adam, and hoyt were all great characters. the ending i think is wolfe's weakest point in this and his other novel, a man in full, though i think charlotte simmons's ending is better because we get to see that she has completely changed and an eerie question to be put to all of us (but especially pseudo-intellectual students like moi) which is- do you really want a life of the mind or do you just want to be known for something no matter what? is it intelligence and answers you want or just fame and money? its a thoughtful (if not exactly original) idea and one i think worked well in the novel.

like i said, im a fan of wolfe's and have to say that this is probably his strongest novel so far because his writing has just improved so much over the years that its so easy to read that the sentences flow brilliantly and you find yourself sitting for hours reading chapter after chapter. i particularly liked the sparta scenes where charlotte is reunited with her family. that and the big frat house party in washington are great (parties are just like that if not wilder).

:banana:

[Sancho]

Hi Noel,

Sorry I missed your earlier thread and I’m happy that you’ve validated this book’s accuracy. As a southern man and Atlanta resident I’ll return the favor and validate his work in A Man in Full. It seemed to me that he managed to go layers deep into the psyche of a Southerner and he illuminated things about the South that, consciously, I never realized existed. I kept finding myself saying, “Ah-Hah! That’s why that works that way here.” Tom Wolfe has amazing perceptive abilities. I wonder what he’s cooking up now.

I also liked the depth of his character development with Charlotte, Adam, JoJo, and Hoyt. I thought Beverly was a bit of a cartoon but I think that was by design. After all, who hasn’t met someone so shallow that they seemed to be a living-breathing-walking cartoon character? In fact, I think I know Beverly. Hah.

I remember watching an interview with him a few years back. The interviewer asked him about his transition from nonfiction to fiction. He replied that his greatest difficulty was in building all of the background details and filling in all of the blank spaces from scratch; with nonfiction he just had to describe what was already there. I agree with you, his writing just keeps getting better and better. It’s a big damn book but I think I read it in about three sittings.