Customer Reviews

The Amboy Dukes

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4 star:		(1)
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In 1945, teenagers were visible as individuals but not as a group. The subculture would come later, with rock and roll, Elvis, and portable radios. Meanwhile there was a depression to work through and a big war to win. Small wonder that kids of that era passed quickly from adolescence to adulthood with hardly time for a coke along the way. The Amboy Dukes is a milestone youth novel of that era. Though not as self-consciously literary as its middle-class competitor Catcher in the Rye, Dukes vividly dramatizes urban despair in a crowded working-class precinct of New York City, and its effect on the Jewish youth gangs spawned there. It was then and remains a classically gritty tale of modern America.

Because Shulman portrays the sexual escapades and pot smoking in candid fashion, it's easy for critics to stigmatize Dukes as a trashy novel. That however neglects the many dimensions to the book, including some very fine writing by the author. Instead, I take it as an honest depiction of what Shulman knew and chose to set out in unusually forceful and unpatronizing terms. Coveted by teenagers of the time for its daring assault on censorship, the language and events may seem tame compared with today's non-existent standards. Yet Shulman's characters and their dramatic narrative remain as fresh and timely as ever, the murder of the teacher standing, in retrospect, as an opening shot in the youth rebellion to come. Substitute Latino or Black for the Jewish Dukes, add a level of drug trafficking, and the story (including the awful conditions that spawned them) remains essentially unchanged from then to now.

Also, author Shulman goes into vivid detail describing the youth fashions and moral behavior of the day, or what kids then considered 'cool'. More important, however, is his sharply drawn slice of class realities, as experienced by pivotal characters Frank Goldberg and his 11-year old sister Alice. Their two wrenching tours through the tonier parts of the city are among the book's memorable highlights. In fact, it is the easily overlooked Alice, and not the more melodramatic gangbangers, who remains the book's most pivotal and sympathetic character. For it is she who's being propelled into a new post-war era with all the sadness and growing sense of entrapment that bedevils the working poor. It is through her youthful enthusiasm slowly succumbing to despair that the book touches a universal chord, as we experience with her the poignancy of a crushing loss of hope. It is here, far from the prurience and rawness of the rest of the book, that Shulman achieves his finest, most revealing moments. I like to think that in the coming years, low-interest loans, Levittowns, and other now much derided assisstance programs redeemed at least some of her innocent dreams. (There's also a glimpse in these passages of the rational basis of consumerism.)

Because of its questionable content, The Amboy Dukes continues to lead an underground existence, overshadowed by the more respectable and refined Catcher in the Rye. But the fact that it has survived the years and continues to be published is testament to a lasting value as social commentary.Though currently out of print, Shulman's book is far more than a teen novel. It is a permanent record of artistic achievement deserving of literary respect, cultural interest, and a continued readership. Pick it up.

I was in junior high school outside New York City when this book made the rounds. (I'm now in my early 70's.) It was a paperback with a racy cover. The word was out in my school: "Wow, this is a great, dirty book." In those days, even George Orwell's "1984" was considered on the border of being racy; so obviously, times were far different then. Kids who got the book (including me) kept it hidden from their parents. I think there may even have been allegations that there was some communist conspiracy behind the book, because it showed the gritty and harsh world of youth gangs in New York--not a flattering picture of America. And it ended tragically. (In those days of the McCarthy hearings and blacklisting, anything that showed anything American in a bad light was believed to somehow be mixed up in communism--at least that's my recollection today of the way things were then.) I still remember, 60 years later, the horrifying last paragraph of the book--but will not divulge it here in case some plan to read the novel.

I kept my copy hidden in my closet, always fearful that my parents might discover it and raise hell with me for reading such "smut." Kids who took the book to school had it confiscated by the faculty. That fact alone increased the desirability of the book--much as the old 'banned by the Catholic Church' or 'banned in Boston' boosted sales of novels and movie tickets.

Amboy Dukes appealed to the sexual interests of we then-adolescent boys who read it. The characters routinely "felt up" their girlfriends and occasionally had sex--much as we hoped to do when we were a little older.

Of course, the social implications were lost on most of us kids. We were more interested in the sexual capers of these 1940's gangbangers. It is only in retrospect, and on reading the earlier reviewer's commentary, that I now see the book in terms of what author Shulman was trying to show us. By the way, the 1949 film "City Across the River" was based on the book. In the credits at the beginning of the film, it says: "Introducing Mr. Anthony Curtis." This was Tony Curtis' first substantial role in a movie!

I was not aware when I read the book that the Amboy Dukes was a Jewish gang, nor that kids joined gangs for protection against other ethnic groups in impoverished, tough areas of New York City and Brooklyn. (I grew up in a solidly middle-class town where there were no gangs.)

Speed ahead one year:

I purchased a relatively pricey used paperback through Amazon and read Amboy Dukes again--this time as a 72-year-old retired man, 60 years and a lot of miles after my first reading. I see now that there was an awful lot of stuff that I surely did not understand as a 12-year-old during the first reading. And I note that the stuff that was considered terribly racy, even lewd, by 1940's standards is practically "G" stuff today. But on my recent re-reading of the novel, I find myself thinking this:

The 16-year-old protagonist Frank Goldfarb and his fellow Dukes were far more sophisticated than any 16-year-olds--or even 19-year-olds--I ever knew. Likewise, in many ways, Frank's younger sister acted like an adult. And the Amboy Dukes, as a teen gang, seemed more like an adult crime family or well organized motorcycle gang. I mean--teenagers having their own club house? Organized with leaders and soldiers? These mythical kids were SMART!

Nevertheless, I enjoyed reading it again, and found that I had forgotten perhaps 80 percent of the book. It was almost like reading it for the first time--except for the grisly ending, which I recalled perfectly. It gave me chills then and now.

Overall, author Shulman presents a pretty gritty view of New York street gangs during the World War Two era.

To Jim Cain

Amboy Dukes wasn't mythical, no, it was true and when the teenagers grew up the group became " Murder Inc."

I also read Amboy Dukes as a teenager, hiding it from my parents. I never bought the book, it was being passed around the school.
I studied to be a Fashion Designer and entered that crazy world of fashion. In the 1960's I was introduced to a man who manufactured handbags. We started going out and after several years, during a conversation I happen to mention the Amboy Dukes; how racy it was and how tough the gang was etc.
When this man just sat there very quietly, smoking on his cigar, like he was pondering what to say, then saying..the book is correct, it was written as it happened. I asked him, how do you know that and he said to me..I was one of the Amboy Dukes. I didn't believe this usualy quite business man could be one of the characters from this book. He went on to tell me that all the names of the gang were real and the boys , as they turned in to men became Murder Inc. that's when he left the gang.
I thought to ask his daughter if in fact her father was a previous AD gang member and she said to me..my father told you about that? Yes, he told me he was an AD and her reply..he must trust you because he never mentions his tough boy hood growing up in Brownsville.
So, I knew Georgie and heard more about the AD's first hand.

MKW

This book was an iconic "coming of age" requirement in the late 40's. Just receiving it brought back a lot of memories. Re-reading it however, showed how what was thought of as lurid back then, through the eyes of an 11 year old, is really very tame by today's standards.

Douglas Doepke did a great job with his concise review. Another reviewer feels the book is outdated. This is clearly a mistake, because the only thing that really changes from one generation to the next are clothing styles and slang. I personally grew up with a similar bunch of thugs in the Bronx during the sixties, and just about every incident mentioned in the Amboy Dukes was replayed at least once. The locations and clothing styles may have been different, but all else remained the same. This book is a must for anyone interested in learning what it's really like to be an urban Juvenile Delinquent.

The Amboy Dukes was also made into a movie (City Across the River), which was Tony Curtis' first major role.

I must admit that I last read this while in high school in the late 50's! You can guess my age from that! I found the book to be really outdated and not worth re-reading. Very little nostalgia even though I was familiar with all the geographic locations in NYC.