Customer Reviews

The Bridge of San Luis Rey (Perennial Classics)

5 star:		(59)
4 star:		(28)
3 star:		(10)
2 star:		(8)
1 star:		(13)

 

 

A brilliant book. Wilder richly deserved the Pulitzer that this book earned. Short, at 133 pages in this edition, it is uniformly excellent. Wilder's sharp wit and turn of phrase are unmatched. The book's theme is powerful and resolved in an unexpected and profound way. Brother Juniper, a thoughtful friar, witnesses the collapse of a rope bridge over a gorge in rural Peru in 1714 and the death of the five people walking along it. He views this event as an opportunity to prove the existence of god and, finally, to elevate theology to the rank of the hard sciences. Juniper instinctively believes that there must be a divine reason for those five to have been chosen for death. He senses god's powerful, latent hand in the bridge's collapse and commits himself to learning all there is to know about the victims in order to discern the plan and prove god's existence. Who were the victims? What were their lives like? Why did they die?

Juniper's conclusions are, of course, inconclusive. He never found the pattern, but remained convinced that it was there, just that he was too poor an intellect to see it. Such questions, naturally, were anathema to the church of the age and Juniper and his book were destroyed for heresy. Readers who focus on the same questions as Juniper are doomed to be just as frustrated. Wilder is far too insightful to let Juniper have the last word, for ultimately, it is not Juniper who stumbles upon the meaning of the five deaths, but the survivors -those who loved the victims- as well as the reader. What the five had in common was that they were human beings, with tender sides and flaws and significant unrequited loves. There is nothing remarkable here, we are all built that way. After their deaths, the Abbess whose orphanage was home to two of the victims realizes that the meaning lies in the lives themselves, in the love the victims shared with those near to them. That there is no immortality, not even memory or good works, so that what matters is the fleeting existence of goodness, and therein lies god's grace. Love is a powerful and immediate force, not a point for theological debate. "Many who have spent a lifetime in passion can tell us less of love than the child that lost a dog yesterday."

Wilder's prose is smooth and polished and yielding of aphorisms: the six attributes of the adventurer (a memory for names and faces, the gift of tongues, inexhaustible invention, secrecy, a talent for chatting with strangers, and a freedom from conscience); or an observation that "the public for which masterpieces are intended is not on this earth." Every line is adept, every page a wonder.

While Wilder wrote the book in 1927, it is perhaps a perfect inquiry into 17th century baroque worldviews and the rationalist philosophies they spawned. The baroque had reached Spain, if not Peru, by 1714. Its fascination with death and the brevity of life ("carpe diem" and countless reminders of the inevitabiity of death) resound her, as do its emphasis on vanity, and theater as a metaphor for life. Lima's theatre, its actresses and audiences, are central to the book. And it is only when the beautiful actress is struck by tragedies that she reaches her resolution in grace. Juniper himself embodies that strange blend of baroque scientific materialism and divine idealism of an age in which Descartes could prove the existence of god while Newton demonstrated god's machinery in motion.

Wilder's solution is much more satisfying than Descartes' or Juniper's. Wilder may have been baroque in his cynicism, but he was decidedly 20th century american in his hopefulness. "The Bridge of San Luis Rey" is a stunning book.

A short, sweet novel. Greater minds than mine awarded it a Pulitzer Prize, so I won't blabber on about its quality. Wilder wastes few words, inserts no extra padding, to tell his story. This lacks the action sequences and suspense of Tom Clancyish pulp, but does sneak up on the intellect, leaving the reader expectantly looking for the subtle connections that weave the characters together.

The manifest story is simple. Five people have fallen to their death in Peru, and Brother Juniper seeks to prove the goodness of God by evaluating their lives to demonstrate exactly why bad things happen. Gently satirical, Wilder consigns poor Brother Juniper to a fitting end, for the chutzpah of attempting to decipher the mind of God with a moral calculus. Juniper has forgotten his Master's admonition, to "judge not." Hidden from Juniper's attempt to make sense of tragedy lay connections that he could never imagine, longings, love unrequited, and loneliness unimaginable. In the end, we learn, not WHY bad things happen, but the power and beauty that can rise from the ashes of tragedy.

Wilder tells snippets of stories, weaving lives together, in a way that goes unnoticed at first, then becomes subliminal, and finally explodes into consciousness at the end. While these lives and their interconnections are somewhat contrived, they effect a transformation, both of the story-line and the reader by the end of the book. Well worth reading a second time.<P...

Thornton Wilder's Pulitzer Prize winning novel takes on the daunting task of exploring whether or not there is a plan behind why we live and die - and how. The debate rages around the incident of the Bridge of San Luis Rey snapping one day, sending five people plummeting to their deaths. Brother Juniper, a Franciscan missionary, witnesses the tragedy and determines to make it the test case in an experiment he has long sought to complete: to prove that the victims were either impious and therefore punished or pious and therefore being whisked away to Heaven to stand beside God. It is a radical study in his time, and its inherent questioning into the nature of the world will ultimately see Brother Juniper mislabeled as a heretic by the church.

The character studies that make up the bulk of the novel (which is really more of a novella given its brevity) are uniformly intriguing, and it is there that "Bridge" truly shines, in addition to Wilder's superb use of language. His portrait of the Marquesa, her servant Pepita, Esteban and his twin brother Manuel, and the Perichole are awe-inspiring glimpses into lives that feel full and true to life - an even greater achievement considering the short amount of time Wilder spends on each of them in order to move the plot forward. If it is more difficult to get a handle on other characters like the Archbishop, the viceroy, Jaime, and the enigmatic Uncle Pio we can forgive Wilder because they still fit the larger scheme of the novel and add to its compelling plot. What emerges from their intertwining lives is the realization that human lives are often too complex to be accurately affixed with such extreme labels as `good' or `bad'. Each has marks for them and against them, making an experiment like Brother Juniper's impossible to complete. There are too many shades of grey to see things as black and white as the missionary would like them to be.

In addition to this main theme, Wilder expertly weaves in questions regarding love, family, and faith. And while I greatly appreciate his refusal to come to any definite answer, one does wish that Wilder had put more into his presentation. In his exploration of this tragic event and its implications he does little more than present evidence for the reader to interpret as they see fit, and the problem there is that they will come away with whatever preconceived notions they may have had regarding the subject perfectly intact. Wilder brings no new insights to the central question and he makes no poignant arguments for either side. "The Bridge of San Luis Rey" is, then, essentially a test case for the reader to apply their own theories to. There will be no earth-shattering revelations to make them reconsider their position, and as good as the novel is in all other respects, I wish that the debate as Wilder presented it had more meat. It certainly isn't lacking in substance, but just a touch more flavor would have been greatly appreciated.

Still, I would highly recommend this book to any lover of literature and anyone who is trying to find their own answers to the question it poses. Wilder's novel takes on additional significance in the wake of 9/11 that makes it even more relevant to modern readers. To read that "The bridge seemed to be among the things that last forever; it was unthinkable that it should break" is to revisit the stunned disbelief that has permeated the years since that tragedy.
Grade: B+

If you have ever wondered what would have happened had you left your house a few minutes earlier this is a book for you. Would the day have been different? Or would your life have been different? Maybe not, but in our minds we make connections about coincidences all the time. The beauty of this book is that it attempts to get at the heart of connections and why a particular group of people happen to all be on a bridge at the time it collapses. The best part of the book is the monk going in search of the people's past because -- being a man who believes in predetermination -- he wonders if indeed the people were fated to be on the bridge at that moment. Those who call this book boring simply don't get it. And those who call it unrealsitic don't have much of an imagination. This book is fiction at it's best because it has the ability to make us actively think about the connections in our lives. And amazingly for all that heady stuff it can be read in one day!

Perhaps better known as a playwright (OUR TOWN and THE MATHCMAKER), Thornton Wilder presented a fast-paced world with a stately novella which proceeds at its own tempo--oblivious of modern demands for mindless action and soulless dialogue. Required high school reading as far back as the 60's, BRIDGE OF SAN LUIS REY still exerts its ingenuous literary charm upon thoughtful readers. Our throw-away society begrudges spending time to consider the deeper questions of life. The Why's of our existence--or mass disaster--prove too mentally stressful to validate such effort.

Conscientious Brother Juniper undertakes an exhaustive examination of the lives of five persons. Although their curiously interrelated lives are not apparent at first, they all died simultaneously while crossing an ancient rope bridge in 18th century Peru. So why should we concern ourselves with the conicidence and obscure destiny of non English-speaking people 200 years ago? Determined to prove to himself (not to mention to atheists and skeptics) that a divine hand masterminded (or simply permitted) the sudden death of five travelers, the earnest friar struggles to juxtapose these ageless questions re the role of God in human life. Is fate merely indifferent to our petty struggles for fame, power and self-esteem? Were these five singled out because of the way they had lived? Were they being punished or rewaded for their earthly sojourns? Or was the fatal unraveling of the rope but a regretful mechanical catastrophe?

Wilder's theatrical experience is revealed in several sections of this novella--where we discern true Scenes and Acts. In fact, he permits increasingly long dialogues between his prime characters in successive chapters. Even his secondary charaters possess remarkable qualities as supporting actors, who appear in several lives. If the bridge which spans the chasm (a metaphor for Life or perhaps Ignorance?) parts without warning, which two landmarks of mortal existence cease to be connected? Individual responses will vary, according to the reader's temperament and moral development. Considered an American litearary classic, THE BRIDGE OF SAN LUIS REY provdes much soul food for private reflection.

A simple Franciscan monk, Brother Juniper, witnesses an accident that kills five travelers. For him, the accident is an opportunity to show that we are all part of God's intelligent plan, not victims of random, meaningless events. His study of these five lives takes many years to complete and fills volumes. In the end, of course, he falls short of his purpose. But his research shows something else. It shows how God's love is expressed in our world, sometimes through worthy and sometimes through what appear to be unworthy messengers. It also shows that no one is so alienated from God that he cannot be reached. Eventually, Brother Juniper suffers for his pretensions to expose the operations of God's will.

Besides its deeply affecting exposition of the theme described above, The Bridge of San Luis Rey is a beautiful evocation of life in 18th century colonial Peru. Thornton Wilder's writing is just exquisite. In one scene, a selfish woman undergoes a transformation and spends the night composing an important letter to her daughter. Before dawn, she goes to the door upon her balcony and looks up "at the great tiers of stars that glittered above the Andes. Throughout the night, though there had been few to hear it, the whole sky had been loud with the singing of these constellations."

The 1975 Pocket Book (Washington Square Enriched Classics) edition I have includes an interesting reader's supplement with illustrations and notes.

The hardest books to review are your favorites. This is my fifth attempt on this one.

The Bridge of San Luis Rey concerns one of the primary questions of human existance. Does God have a plan for our deaths and is there a reason we die? (Pretend that was only one question.) This novel is certainly the best to explore the topic. It is vastly insightful and gives its insight within a powerful narrative.

The novel begins with the collapse of the bridge of San Luis Rey which kills the five people crossing it. Brother Juniper witnesses the catastrophe, and he decides to use this opportunity to study the reasons for death. What follows is the story of each of the persons' lives who died. In each story you find a connecting bond: love. Each had been touched by love. The stories together reaveal simply that. Everyones' life matters because of love, and the dead are still connected to the living by a bridge of love.

What I've written about the novel is really too simplistic. The Bridge of San Luis Rey is only a very short novel, but within those pages is a multitude of insight which cannot be explained in a short review (especially without giving away too much of the book). I think that I'll just conclude this rambling review by saying that this is a beautiful little novel which deserves a place among the very top novels of last century. I also think that in wake of the Sept. 11 tragedy, The Bridge of San Luis Rey could gain importance by giving the people affected insight into the tragedy and comfort them.

If you want to read a novel written in masterful, melodic prose with exquisite character development, an intriguing and beguiling plot structure, and a work of profound substance and meaning, read this book. It is a true work of art. Read it, then read any contemporary American novel, read any winner of the National Book Awards, Pulitzer Prizes, etc., and see the dearth of talent that exists among even our most "distinguished" prose stylists. Read it aloud and hear how a master of the English language can construct a narrative that is as perfect to the ear as a piece of classical music.

"On Friday noon, July the twentieth, 1714, the finest bridge in all Peru broke and precipitated five travelers into the gulf below." When Brother Juniper witnesses this tragedy first-hand, he resolves to find in it scientific evidence of God's plan. The randomness of this evident, in Juniper's mind, makes it the perfect laboratory for investigating this question. "Here at last one could surprise His intentions in a pure state." Before the victims had even hit the ground, he already plans on investigating their lives. Short, beautiful, and nearly perfect, THE BRIDGE OF SAN LUIS REY earned Thornton Wilder the first of his three Pulitzer prizes.

The lives of the five victims of the bridge are thoroughly recounted leading up to the moment they all came together to cross the bridge. Brother Juniper came up with his conclusions regarding the tragedy, but ultimately, he was not satisfied with his results. He did, however, realize that he learned least about the victims in question in speaking with those that were close to them. It was these very survivors, however, away from Juniper's questions and after the friar's execution who ultimately did find some answers.

I was moved by the final conclusion of the book: that out lives are transient and unremarkable but to those whom we love and who love us, and our very existence dies with those that cared for us. "...almost no one remembers Esteban and Pepita but myself... But soon we shall die and all memory of those five will have left the earth, and we ourselves should be loved for awhile and forgotten. But the love will have been enough..." I can't find a better argument for living in the moment.

Jeremy W. Forstadt

I came into this book expecting one thing. After the first part, Perhaps an Accident, my expectations had completely altered. As I read through the second part, Marquesa de Montemeyor, my expectations were slowly changing even more. By the beginning of the third part, Esteban, my expectations had transformed so much they were hardly recognizable.

I came into it expecting a novel about a man of religion's struggle with faith. By the first few pages I came to realize it had much more of a non-fiction lean, at this point I was scared of being bored. As I started to read part two I began to realize it wasn't about this Brother Juniper at all but the people in the accident. Throughout parts of the first chapter I have to admit I did feel bored, but near the end it caught fire and I was wowed by the first part's finish. This reinvested my firm belief that the ending of a short story will completely redeem it, for that's what each part was: a short story telling the complete life of one of the victims in the accident of the bridge.

The story of Thornton Wilder's Pulitzer Prize winner is that a bridge (the finest bridge in all of Peru) snapped and five travelers fell to their death. Brother Jupiter decided to use this accident to prove that it was God's will. This man found it more difficult than he expected discovering an ambiguity in life that he had not seen. Basically the novel to me is detailing the complexity and mystery of life.

I would say the way The Bridge of San Luis Rey was written was, generally, not exceptionally appealing to me. It was told almost exactly like a textbook account of the events. Using this method though, there were dazzling moments when the book flowed like poetry.

The book also seemed slightly tedious at times. Certain sections were difficult to get through but as I pressed on I felt a certain gratification, in knowing that I was being shown snapshots of life that were almost as real as they get.

Despite these downfalls (which had their upshots as well), the meaning of the book made it for me. The characters were all taken on spiritual journeys and though each story ended in death, which was a death too early for all of them, there was a certain bittersweet happiness in their soulful accomplishments.

In total I would suggest the Bridge of San Luis Rey but only if you're willing to fully concentrate whenever you pick this book up. It can be a beautiful book but only if first acknowledged as a tough book.