A successful Iowa farmer decides to divide his farm between his three daughters. When the youngest objects, she is cut out of his will. This sets off a chain of events that brings dark truths to light and explodes long-suppressed emotions. An ambitious reimagining of Shakespeare’s King Lear cast upon a typical American community in the late twentieth century, A Thousand Acres takes on themes of truth, justice, love, and pride, and reveals the beautiful yet treacherous topography of humanity.
A Thousand Acres: A Novel
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Book Description
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Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com Review
Aging Larry Cook announces his intention to turn over his 1,000-acre farm--one of the largest in Zebulon County, Iowa--to his three daughters, Caroline, Ginny and Rose. A man of harsh sensibilities, he carves Caroline out of the deal because she has the nerve to be less than enthusiastic about her father's generosity. While Larry Cook deteriorates into a pathetic drunk, his daughters are left to cope with the often grim realities of life on a family farm--from battering husbands to cutthroat lenders. In this winner of the 1991 National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction, Smiley captures the essence of such a life with stark, painful detail.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Publishers Weekly
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the NBCC Award for fiction, a BOMC dual main selection and a five-week PW bestseller in cloth, Smiley's novel of family life on an insular Iowa farm raises profound questions about human conduct and moral responsibility.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
61 of 70 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
When this book was chosen by our book club for this month's theme of "tragedy," I approached reading it with some trepidation. There are a number of things that I don't care for in literature, and one of them is the family drama which centers on the drama as drama for its own sake, rather than to say something more about the world. Part of my bias against this kind of writing comes from having cut my eyeteeth on science fiction, the literature of ideas which, at its best, is about today as much as it is about a future. I also spent three years in a creative writing program where, god bless them, my fellow students seemed to spend a lot of time writing autobiographical stories that didn't have much to say beyond it sucks to grow up in fill-in-the-blank. The book had won a Pulitzer, and if there's anything I learned in my MFA classes on literature, an award was often a signal that a book was not for the reader but written for the critics. A Thousand Acres screamed to me from its cover that it was that kind of book, that focused on the dissolution of the family as seen through a retelling of the King Lear story. I shuddered.
But, really, I shouldn't have. Having previously read two books by Jane Smiley (the quite amusing MOO and the intelligent and thoughtful Thirteen Ways of Looking at the Novel), I should have given her the benefit of the doubt. Within the first fifty pages, I was surprised that Smiley had drawn me into her story, and while it was still fairly mundane (the family dog wasn't going to start talking on page 100, to my dismay), I found the voice of the narrator intriguing and wondered just how much of King Lear Smiley was going to be able to transpose to 1970s Iowa. Turns out, quite a bit, in a wondrously deft way that I would have termed a 'tour de force' if I used that phrase anymore.
The narrator is the eldest of the three daughters, and instead of a king dividing up his kingdom, the family farm is to be divided among the daughters somewhat early by forming a corporation in which he gives control of the farm to the children, in a sudden move that delights the older daughters and their husbands and alarms the youngest, who no longer lives on the farm nor has much to do with it. Her concern about the alacrity of his decision infuriates the father, so much that he cuts her out of the paperwork process and thus the land itself. Pretty much every plot point in the Shakespearean play is touched upon in some manner, but never so roughly that the connections feel strained. If anything, Smiley's version is much, much more subtle in its understanding of the character's motivations, giving both a sympathetic portrait of the older two sisters that is entirely missing in the play, as well as making the Lear figure less of a madman and more of a stubborn one, such that when his stubbornness leads him into the rain, his madness becomes if not sensible, at least reasonable. You don't necessarily take any one character's side in this fight, but none seems such a villain.
What Smiley does that, I think, one-ups Shakespeare even more than making the female characters sympathetic is that she truly makes the tragedy about the land as about the people. In the background, and infusing everything the character's do to a point, is the thousand acres of the title. Perhaps it is because it is hard for us to imagine a kingdom as something one can own and pass to your children, for it's very easy to grasp the concept of these thousand acres, how much they mean to the family, and how tragic it is that this family cannot hold on to that land. In the past, I've been less than sympathetic to the concept of the family farm, but even my cold heart can't read what Smiley has described here and see it as anything but a tragedy.
What this novel has over the modern literature that I feared it would be is not only a plot (people die here, not to mention being maimed and insulted and cruelly treated) but a larger meaning, and that big picture of this being more than just a personal tragedy, is what makes this worthwhile reading. Out of the group who read this for book club, I turned out to rate this book the highest, and that is to say, I recommend it strongly.
But, really, I shouldn't have. Having previously read two books by Jane Smiley (the quite amusing MOO and the intelligent and thoughtful Thirteen Ways of Looking at the Novel), I should have given her the benefit of the doubt. Within the first fifty pages, I was surprised that Smiley had drawn me into her story, and while it was still fairly mundane (the family dog wasn't going to start talking on page 100, to my dismay), I found the voice of the narrator intriguing and wondered just how much of King Lear Smiley was going to be able to transpose to 1970s Iowa. Turns out, quite a bit, in a wondrously deft way that I would have termed a 'tour de force' if I used that phrase anymore.
The narrator is the eldest of the three daughters, and instead of a king dividing up his kingdom, the family farm is to be divided among the daughters somewhat early by forming a corporation in which he gives control of the farm to the children, in a sudden move that delights the older daughters and their husbands and alarms the youngest, who no longer lives on the farm nor has much to do with it. Her concern about the alacrity of his decision infuriates the father, so much that he cuts her out of the paperwork process and thus the land itself. Pretty much every plot point in the Shakespearean play is touched upon in some manner, but never so roughly that the connections feel strained. If anything, Smiley's version is much, much more subtle in its understanding of the character's motivations, giving both a sympathetic portrait of the older two sisters that is entirely missing in the play, as well as making the Lear figure less of a madman and more of a stubborn one, such that when his stubbornness leads him into the rain, his madness becomes if not sensible, at least reasonable. You don't necessarily take any one character's side in this fight, but none seems such a villain.
What Smiley does that, I think, one-ups Shakespeare even more than making the female characters sympathetic is that she truly makes the tragedy about the land as about the people. In the background, and infusing everything the character's do to a point, is the thousand acres of the title. Perhaps it is because it is hard for us to imagine a kingdom as something one can own and pass to your children, for it's very easy to grasp the concept of these thousand acres, how much they mean to the family, and how tragic it is that this family cannot hold on to that land. In the past, I've been less than sympathetic to the concept of the family farm, but even my cold heart can't read what Smiley has described here and see it as anything but a tragedy.
What this novel has over the modern literature that I feared it would be is not only a plot (people die here, not to mention being maimed and insulted and cruelly treated) but a larger meaning, and that big picture of this being more than just a personal tragedy, is what makes this worthwhile reading. Out of the group who read this for book club, I turned out to rate this book the highest, and that is to say, I recommend it strongly.
45 of 51 people found the following review helpful
By A Customer
Format:Paperback
I am a college student, and as a logical step after readingKing Lear in my literary analysis class, we then turned our focus on Athousand Acres. I can't say how glad I am that this book fell across my path. Throughout my book my opinions about the characters changed so often, that I didn't know who to trust and who was the good guy and who was the bad guy. I came in with the expectation that Larry and Caroline would be the heroes, and that even though Ginny was the narrator we would clearly realize that she is evil. However, the characterization in this book is so deep and intricate that it is nearly impossible to lable one character as truly evil, except for the surprising conclusion of Larry Cook, whom I hated with a passion. However, this book can not be read with the expectation that it will give the reader pleasure. Instead, it reaches into the very depths of your emotions and twists them around with so vigorous a hand that you are nearly sickened by some of the action in the story. This book has some of the greatest depth I have ever known in a novel, and incorporates many subjects and undertones into its plot.
60 of 71 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
As I read Jane Smiley's prize-winning novel, I tried my darnedest not to think about those much-ballyhooed parallels with *King Lear*. I find the "updated version of" phenomenon, which includes, for example, Helen Fielding's *Bridget* diary (*Price and Prejudice* update) to be gimmicky and distracting. Write your own novels, people!
That said, I can now declare that I think *A Thousand Acres* is a good, but not "great" novel. Jane Smiley is an excellent writer, and although the book starts a bit slowly, the momentum and intrigue build as pages fly by. Her ability to describe the landscapes, moods, and rhythms of midwestern farm life is commendable, and for me, this proved to be perhaps the most consistently satisfying aspect of the book.
The plot can only be described as "dark," perhaps excessively so to seem plausible. Incest, insanity, suicide, the casual plotting of vengeful murders--anything that might form the basis for an extended commentary on the possibilities for depravity in the Human Condition--it's all here! There is so much depravity here, in fact, that after a while I found myself (figuratively) rolling my eyes at each new twist in the plot. A bit over the top, Jane!
I confess that I found it dismaying that each and every male character in the book proved himself to be rotten, exhibiting behavior ranging anywhere from insensitive clottishness to manipulative and smarmy don Juanism to ranting, bullying, incest-practicing insanity. What a bunch of great guys! In all fairness, the women in the book aren't much better. The book's protagonist seems to be the one island of reasonableness until the surprising (and in my view, implausible) plot twist that proves that she, too, is capable of ANYTHING (I don't feel I should give the plot away here :-) ).
Overall, the book is gripping, well-written, and certainly worth reading. To my taste, however, Jane Smiley has gone a bit over the top in her portrayal of characters and in some aspects of the plot. The book ultimately turns into a veritable caricature of a "dark novel revealing the hideous inner secrets that lie behind the placid facade," blah, blah, blah.
Most Recent Customer Reviews
1.0 out of 5 stars
Drawn out and too much drama
This book was selected for a book club I am in. If it was not for book club, I would never have read the entire book. Read more
Published 14 days ago by GMC
5.0 out of 5 stars
In Our Group Discussion We Became Gossips
An aged patriarch, to keep ancestral land in the family, divides it among his three adult daughters, though abruptly cutting off the youngest over what seems a minor insult. Read more
Published 21 days ago by James M. Baird
5.0 out of 5 stars
1992 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction
Back in the late nineties I saw a list of Pulitzer prize winners for fiction, and since I loved reading, i challenged myself to read all the books on the list. Read more
Published 22 days ago by J. Valadez
5.0 out of 5 stars
The "real" Bridges of Madison Country...
Jane Smiley won the Pulitzer Prize in 1992 for this work. Both her novel and The Bridges of Madison County are set in rural Iowa, and involve, in part, the love affairs of farmer's... Read more
Published 24 days ago by John P. Jones III
3.0 out of 5 stars
OK
I think that it started off kind of slow. Eventually it did get more interesting. It was kind of depressing though.
Published 25 days ago by Donna Hurd
5.0 out of 5 stars
My Report
I really enjoyed the book .It was very interesting. My pen pal told me she was reading this book so that is why I got it to read.
Published 2 months ago by Louise Higginbotham
5.0 out of 5 stars
great book
Interesting book, love this writer. Fifteen more words required? You must think I am as wordy as this author. Right?
Published 2 months ago by Anita
3.0 out of 5 stars
Good farm description
This story is about the sad demise of a farm family and their farm. It is a tragedy and unfortunately there are many such Iowa tragedys.
Published 3 months ago by Grandon
2.0 out of 5 stars
A Thousand acres
So this book was OK it didn't have to good of an ending like why did Jess stay with Rose and did even say bye to Ginny there was no closeing ,but I would recommend this book to a... Read more
Published 4 months ago by Sidney P.
2.0 out of 5 stars
A thousand acres
DISAPPOINTED IN THIS HAD HEARD GOOD REVIEWS BUT NOT IMPRESSED. was quite boring kept waiting for it to get exciting but that didnt happen.
Published 5 months ago by jan seal
