Modern Suburbia in Literature

[mrmontagne]

I've been given the opportunity to write an essay on any subjet of my choice and, considering I'm a Literature and Film student, I've decided to compare the two.

What I want to consider is the portrayal of modern suburbia (people, values etc.) and while I can think of several examples of films to consider, i'm really struggling with books.

So can you lovely people think of any books that would allow me to take an interesting look at modern suburbia?

Thanks,
Dan

[OrphanPip]

Idk how modern you want to go, I'm kind of at a blank for stuff, maybe Updike's Rabbit Run. Updike wrote exclusively about the American middle class, so there must be some other stuff by him. Yates' Revolutionary Road was a novel before it was a film as well.

Hopefully, someone more helpful will come around.

[Ristshot]

Something Happened by Joseph Heller should do the trick. Especially if one of the movies is American Beauty.

[jimjonesrobot]

I'm sorry I can't provide anything more specific (as I don't know whether you want novels about suburbia released in the last few years or...), but you could try LibraryThing's Suburbia tag (http://www.librarything.com/tag/suburbia&more=1).

[sixsmith]

Something Happened by Joseph Heller should do the trick. Especially if one of the movies is American Beauty.

Something Happened is a minor masterpiece. Great suggestion. Revolutionary Road is, in my opinion, one of the great 20th century American novels and certainly fits the suburban bill. Whether it can still be called 'modern' depends on your criteria.

Richard Ford's Frank Bascombe novels (The Sportswriter, Independence Day, The Lay of the Land) contain rich descriptions of suburban New Jersey, and are, moreover, surprisingly compelling in their rendering of middle class malaise.

[kelby_lake]

I've been given the opportunity to write an essay on any subjet of my choice and, considering I'm a Literature and Film student, I've decided to compare the two.

What I want to consider is the portrayal of modern suburbia (people, values etc.) and while I can think of several examples of films to consider, i'm really struggling with books.

So can you lovely people think of any books that would allow me to take an interesting look at modern suburbia?

Thanks,
Dan

I'm guessing that one of your films is American Beauty. If not, it should be.

Revolutionary Road was fifties suburbia. In A Single Man, George - a middle-aged Englishman who's in mourning for his male partner- lives in an American suburbia, the banality of which reflects his depression (although not sure how good it would be for study)
The Virgin Suicides is one about suburbia, I think.

There's always Desperate Housewives!

[dfloyd]

who is often called the Chekov of suburbia. His story, The Swimmer, was made into a movie with Burt Lancaster.

[mrmontagne]

Thank you so much for all the wonderful suggestions guys. As far as the criteria 'modern' goes, I'd say anywhere from the end of WW2 onwards. I'll be sure to check out Revolutionary Road and Something Happened particularly, as well as everything else.

I'd really appreciate some more suggestions and if anybody can think of any good novels about British suburbia I'd greatly appreciate it.

Thanks for the fantastic response so far :]

[kelby_lake]

Ah, British suburbia, lemme think. 'That Face' is a play about a middle-class family (upper middle, really) who are pretty screwed up.

I'll try and think about this- there must be something.

[antiprefix]

The novel Ordinary People concerns suburban dysfunction. The main character is a suicidal teenage boy who has trouble fitting in at school and with his family.

[Pecksie]

'Little Children' by Tom Perrotta. I wasn't expecting much, but it was surprisingly good (though not great).

[jimjonesrobot]

I'd really appreciate some more suggestions and if anybody can think of any good novels about British suburbia I'd greatly appreciate it.

Thanks for the fantastic response so far :]

There's Arlington Park by Rachel Cusk which follows the lives of five young suburban women over the course of one day. The only thing is I don't know if it qualifies as 'good' as it has mixed reviews.

[kasie]

Like kelby lake, I've been trying to come up with titles for you but it seems to me that, post WWII, Britain was preoccupied with class and region, rather than place such as urban/suburban.

The only celebrant of suburbia I can think of was John Betjeman who extolled the virtues of Metroland, the suburban sprawl that grew up around the Metroplitan railway line out of London, but that was poetry and 1930s, so may be outside your remit.

Later into the 50s/60s, you might consider books by writers like Margaret Drabble, Margaret Forster, Elizabeth Taylor, Penelope Fiztgerald, Barbara Pym, Penelope Lively, all of whom wrote of 'ordinary' lives and by implication suburban rather than urban. Books that were filmed and depict more regional working class life rather than suburban life were Room at the Top (Braine), Saturday Night and Sunday Morning and The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner, both by Alan Sillitoe, This Sporting Life (Storey).

I think surburbia was portrayed on tv rather than written about - by the mid/late-50s, tv was in most UK homes and programmes such as The Grove Family were popular. The 70s series The Good Life was an hilarious depiction of trying to get back to self-sufficiency in the London suburbs and Brookside showed life in the 70s spread of new-build estates which could have been anywhere in Britain.

You may be able to find a dvd of Abigail's Party (Leigh) which is set in an anonymous suburb but does not, I think, portray the average life lived there!

[kelby_lake]

oh yeah, Abigail's Party.

[Henry Please]

+1 on Updike's Rabbit Novels and Ford's Frank Bascomb trilogy. Also Richard Yates.

Some others:

David Gates -- "Jernigan"
Lorrie Moore -- "A Gate at the Stairs"
Johnathan Franzen -- "The Corrections" and "Freedom"
John Cheever -- "The Wapshot Chronicle" and "Bullet Park"
Jeffrey Eugenides -- "Middlesex" and "The Virgin Suicides"
Charles Baxter -- "The Feast of Love"
Rick Moody -- "The Ice Storm"
Christos Tsiolkas -- "The Slap" (Australian)
Evan S. Connell -- "Mrs. Bridge" and "Mr. Bridge" (My personal favorites)
John McGregor -- "If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things" (British)
Don DeLillo -- "White Noise"
Hannah Pittard -- "The Fates Will Find Their Way"
Chris Bachelder -- "Abbot Awaits"

[AuntShecky]

All of the examples which our well-read LitNutters provided will be valuable, especially the short stories of John Cheever. If you want a non-fiction look
at suburbia today, read On Paradise Drive by David Brooks. Here's a
review:
http://www.online-literature.com/forums/showthread.php?t=57500