Customer Reviews

Dreaming of Babylon: A Private Eye Novel 1942

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Ya gotta know by now that nobody writes like Richard Brautigan. He's a force unto himself and sorely missed. In Dreaming of Babylon, 1977, he's gotta 40s gumshoe, C. Card, who's so broke he has to borrow a friend's gun 'cause he can't afford his own. But the gun has no bullets so he has to find them somewhere as well. What a guy.

The title refers to C's tendency to picture himself in a land of imagination that takes him far away from the everyday world into a place that rewards him with a beauteous dame (natch) and all kinds of pleasures and stuff. With chapter titles like "Mustard", "A Babylonian Sand Watch", and "Barcelona", it's not hard to tell C. loves fantasizing a lot, as well as moving back and forth between that and the nitty gritty stuff of life.

Of course every chapter is 2 or 3 pages; the largest is 6. Here's a great little excerpt: "'You've broken your mother's heart', she'd always say then and I'd answer, 'Don't say that, Mom, just because I'm a private detective. I still love you.'"

C. has to solve a murder (of course; otherwise this wouldn't be a private eye novel) and the things that happen to him are funny and ridiculous and strange and tense and just plain dumb sometimes. But that's life, ain't it? He goes about his business like a goofball sometimes and sometimes he actually has enough smarts to put two and two together--when he's not off in Babylon somewhere....

You don't read Brautigan for a linear plot and non-whimsical writing. You don't read him if you want characters who take themselves seriously embedded in worlds of text whose author also takes himself seriously. You read Brautigan 'cause you know he's gotta sense of humor nobody else ever did, does, or will have. You read him 'cause he's a guy whose heart is a whole lot bigger than a breadbox and who thinks with it really well. You read him because he knows how to tell a story that makes you laugh and sigh a little and maybe understand a little better how to be in this world.

Read him.

Brautigan's "Dreaming of Babylon" chronicles the dreamscape of a down-on-his-luck private eye. Drawing in seedy tones, he explores the inner dreamscape of the character. The escapism of the protagonist, as well as the hopelessness, mirror those Brautigan felt in this stage of his career. The inventive turns of phrase and wry humour are there, but an underlying sadness permeates the plot; the outcome, failures, and cramped, small dreams are known from the beginning. The protagonist is a stand-in for Brautigan, much as in "Sombrero Fallout" and other later works. As one who owns all his fiction, I think of this as one of the sadder books. Andy Reeves

A powerful insight into the mind of a down-and-out detective. The novel captures the essence of dreamscape and proves to be a most admirable read. I would recommend this to anyone who is interested in the detective novel genre.

"Dreaming of Babylon" is Brautigan's spoof of the mystery world. In it, we encounter a blundering private eye who discovers a dead body in his apartment. As he sets out to solve this mystery, we discover he has a problem with "dreaming of Babylon," which is a sort of daydream-as-narcoleptic state. Fun, without a doubt. But the writing is hurried and simple, and this just doesn't feel like he was into it. With a little more focus, this could have been more exciting. As it is, it still provides hours of literary fun

I am a fan of Brautigan because he wrote the most comic contemporary American fiction in my lifetime. Much of my literary life is opposed to the nature of modern entertainment values distracting people from the major questions that Americans would like answers to if everything weren't secret. Dreaming of Babylon has such a close examination of modern mentalities that I was able to find an analysis on the web based on Lacan's notions of infant progress. I would love to quote that instead of the book Brautigan wrote, but the novel is an incredible example likely to make a much deeper impression in your mind than any explanation ever could.