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Henderson the Rain King

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1 star:		(4)

 

 

A few days ago I finished reading Saul Bellow's Henderson the Rain King, which was a great and entertaining read. The basic premise is comedic: a grumpy, spoiled, acerbic, rich American in his 50's seeks to discover meaning and wisdom and fulfillment by leaving New York and traveling to Africa to live and commune with a primitive African tribe. If this induces at least a subtle chuckle, then it is safe to say that you'd be laughing frequently through this hilarious and sometimes ribald romp. Not enough? Then consider that it has been named as one of the 100 best English-language novels of the 20th century by the well-respected Modern Library.

Henderson is an independently wealthy man in his 50's who is unhappily married to his second wife, and when he gets to the point where he can stand his meager existence no longer and the trivial aimlessness of it all, he hires a guide to take him to the remote, African sahara, to the most primitive tribe they can find. They first end up with the Arnewi tribe, where Henderson becomes obsessed with the tribe's superstitious obsession with the frogs in the cistern, which keeps them from watering their cattle, and so in his attempt to rid them of this malady he ends up blowing up the whole thing while fending off the advances of a large women who is considered a beauty due to her "bittahness." After destroying the cistern, Henderson and his guide escape and try again with the Wariri tribe where he impresses the natives with his unparalleled feats of strength (Festivus, anyone?), which then propels him unwittingly into the position of sungo (rain king) when rain immediately follows. There he befriends the king of the tribe, Dahfu, and the tale of Henderson carries us on a humorous journey where we come face to face with lions, tall amazonian women, and scheming uncles.

Henderson is an interesting counter figure to someone like, say, Roth's Swede Levov (American Pastoral), where both men have a privileged adulthood but yet both are incapable of settling down into it. Levov gets tragically ripped away while Henderson is comically tied to it even in the far reaches of Africa. Henderson's pretentiousness and bombastic response to everything (his attempt to kill his little house cat still makes me laugh) makes him the perfect target for Dahfu's psychological experiment, for even in his gregariousness, Henderson's goal is to existentially discover the importance of being an intricate, vital element of some grand venture, which Dahfu supplies.

One might fall into the temptation of reading this book as a generic critique of the dangers of "civilization" within a sort of Rousseauian framework, although the "savages" in Bellow's book are something less than entirely "noble." Nevertheless, I decline to read it this way, for I think the book speaks to psychology, to the inner man, to the aspirations and "life-force" in a discontented soul, rather than to politics or history or the delimitating ways in which cultural norms interact with those on other continents. Or, one could just sit back and have a grand old time laughing at Henderson, and the fact that he laughs at himself, even in his gargantuan seriousness, makes us love him all the more. He's like that grouchy, eccentric grandfather we can't help but love, even in his most obnoxious cantankerousness.

The bottom line, though, is that this book is terribly funny and clever, and Bellow has a way of avoiding the negative qualities of stream-of-consciousness prose while at the same time distilling from it its funnier aspects. This was the first Saul Bellow book that I had ever read, but immediately afterwards I put several more on my reading list.

This is the BEST book I've read in ages. I found it so thoroughly engaging, I couldn't put it down! Eugene Henderson, a great (often) drunken oaf of a man--rich, somewhat crass, a man who does not suffer fools gladly and makes life for his wives and children difficult--chafes at the restraints of a sophisticated, civilized existence in New York and makes his way into Africa. Once there, all his innate qualities--sheer strength, his instincts, rashness,while drawbacks in an artifical social world--serve him well in the natural world. He encounters princes, kings and hired guides, who he treats with equal respect. Africa gives him an arena to test himself, quench his thirst for an answer to the internal (and for him, eternal) question that eludes him throughout his life: I want, I want, I want. Through his journey, he finds out what he really wants to do with the rest of his life and comes out of this adventure with a greater sense of who he really is. Saul Bellow makes Henderson and his experiences so real, the reader feels as though he or she is there, seeing it all through Henderson's eyes. I think this book is a gem, a completely entertaining read.

Gene Henderson, a 50-something millionaire living in 1950s America, decides to take a trip to Africa to try to quiet the voice inside him that keeps saying "I want, I want." Since Henderson already has everything material he could want, he can't find any way to satisfy that voice, and he has already tried several other things prior to his African trip. I'm not sure what Bellow intended, but as I read it, Henderson represents America - huge, crude, often well-meaning but causing destruction nevertheless. Bellow's imaginary Africa would then be the entire developing world - or even the whole world outside America. It's hard to like Henderson at first; even his own first-person narration casts him in a bad light. As his attempts to help the people in the first tribe he meets end in catastrophe, he seems to represent the American ignorance and arrogance that led to so many disastrous overseas projects in the 1950s and 1960s. Subdued by his first failure, Henderson allows himself to learn from the second tribe, and although he ultimately barely escapes with his life, he comes away with the inner peace he had sought, with a new wisdom, and with a determination to become a healer. The message seems pretty obvious.

An alternative way to read it makes Henderson representative of anyone who no longer has to work for a living and who searches for something to give life meaning. This should resonate with any young dot com millionaire as much as with any healthy retired person. Either way, the book reads smoothly and moves along briskly. Read it long enough to get past your initial dislike of Henderson, and it will reward your efforts.

The title character of Saul Bellow's "Henderson the Rain King" is one of the most remarkable personalities in modern literature. Most first-person narrators just kind of lay on the page, passively hoping the reader will sympathize with or care about them; but Eugene Henderson is a three-dimensional creation, arrogant, energetic, restless, engaging the reader with his lively banter and gleeful impudence.

55-year-old Henderson is a millionaire by inheritance, aimlessly sleepwalking through life, married to a ditzy wife, and channeling ancestral spirits by playing his dead father's violin. Needing a vacation from his family and his dreary normal existence, and feeling that "...it's the destiny of [his] generation of Americans to go out in the world and try to find the wisdom of life," he travels to Africa and impulsively decides to go off into the wild.

A hired guide named Romilayu leads him to two remote villages. The first is inhabited by a tribe called the Arnewi. He observes with delight that the Arnewi village must be older than the city of Ur -- this is what he was looking for, the cradle of civilization, unblemished by the advances of modern society. Here he finds the natives in a crisis: their precious cattle are dying of thirst because the water in the village cistern is undrinkable. On his own initiative, he tries to solve their problem; but his plan fails disastrously, and he and Romilayu leave the village in shame.

They go to a second village, inhabited by a larger tribe called the Wariri, ruled by a king named Dahfu. The Wariri are suffering from a drought and go through elaborate rituals in order to conjure rain. When Henderson unexpectedly helps them bring a deluge, Dahfu proclaims him the "Rain King" and the two become close, almost brotherly, friends. Henderson learns that Dahfu cannot have complete sovereignty over the tribe until he captures the lion containing the soul of his dead father, the former king, and Dahfu asks Henderson to help him in the hunt. But human corruption knows no geographical boundaries, and Henderson and Romilayu soon find themselves in a dangerous situation from which it will require all their physical and mental capacities to save themselves.

More refined and terser than "The Adventures of Augie March," "Henderson the Rain King" offers a wonderfully balanced mixture of philosophy, suspense, and humor. While Augie wandered through life looking for a purpose, a goal, Henderson seems to find his, affirming it through his own adventures and taking the reader along for the exhilarating ride. You'll be cheering for the guy, not because he's the hero, but because he's more human than most of the people you know.

Saul Bellow seems to me to be one of those writers who is only fully appreciated by readers who have reached a certain age and thus have a certain amount of life experience under their belts. Before "Henderson the Rain King," the only other Bellow I'd read was "Seize the Day," and I read that one in high school. The two books are similar in that they both have middle-aged male protagonists who are at some point of crisis in their lives. "Seize the Day" was completely lost on me, but I wonder if I read it now whether I might find more meaning in it.

I've still got a ways to go before I become middle-aged myself, but nevertheless, there's a lot I related to in the character of Eugene Henderson. Affluent, arrogant and pig-headed, Henderson seems like the kind of man who should want for nothing, since he's rich enough to buy what he doesn't have and aggressive enough to bully his way into getting anything he can't buy. But he still finds himself haunted by an internal voice that chants "I want, I want," and because he doesn't know himself what it is that he wants, he takes an impulsive trip to Africa to see if he can find it in the desert wilds.

"Henderson" the novel is actually very funny, and Henderson the character is himself quite charming. Bellow is careful to only fill you in on Henderson's belligerent (and sometimes abusive) behavior as something that has happened in the past. The Henderson we come to know over the course of the novel is one who is open and respectful to new cultures and is eager to learn that which can only be taught by others. He strikes up a close friendship with Dahfu, King of the Wairiri, an African tribe, and it's their relationship--and primarily what Henderson learns about himself from Dahfu--that comprises the majority of the novel's plot.

"Henderson the Rain King" should appeal to anyone with politically left leanings and especially those who are frustrated by the materialist obsessions that plagues our culture. As others have said before this, the plot is actually quite simple, and one drawback to the book is that its story does not warrant its length. I didn't find Bellow's prose dense as some others have, but you do have to exhibit some patience with him as a writer, as he's prone to tangents and ruminative wanderings.

All in all, however, this was a very enjoyable book and led me to believe that I might enjoy Saul Bellow after all.

Just throw logic out the window. That is what you must do before reading Bellow's over the top and zany, Henderson the Rain King. This is a pure exercise of originality and wit, which in this case, takes precedent over believability, credibility, or consistency. Hold on tight for a wild and bumpy ride through the expanse of Africa and an even wilder ride through Henderson's mind, which is so relentlessly cluttered and wish-washy, that when the story is completed, it felt like more of a dream than a real life event.

The story opens with Henderson ranting on and skipping mercilessly from one event to another to try and explain why he went to Africa in the first place. He tells us everything from how he raises pigs, to how he got his fortune, his marriage, divorce, love life, etc. (and that is all in the first chapter!) I felt a headache coming on, and I feared the book was going to assault my senses by leaping to and fro and a dizzying pace. But don't worry, things do calm down a bit as the story rolls on.

Henderson eventually ends up telling his marvelous and unbelievable story of his journey through Africa. At first, he is a third wheel to a honeymooning couple, but he ends up ditching them with the tour guide, Romilayu. They begin their crazy journey from that point on. First, he visits a tribe called the Arnewi. He ends up wresting their leader in a match of strength. Henderson wins and they become instant friends. The Arnewi worship cattle and many of them are dying off due to lack of water. Henderson, in his attempt to help out, actually causes a delightfully chaotic scene among this tribe that you will have to read to believe. Ashamed from the disaster he has caused, he escapes with Romilayu again into the desert.

After that, Henderson wanders into an even stranger African tribe called the Wariri. At first, they are not treated kindly. Henderson quickly makes friends with their king Dahfu, and things begin to change drastically. Soon, he is a favorite of the tribe with his goofy antics, and even becomes their "Rain king", which is a leader next to the king that somehow controls the weather. (He is initiated in a wildly bizarre ceremony that is unlike anything you have ever read). Together, Henderson and Dahfu begin a quest to capture a mysterious lion named Gmilo, who is actually Dahfu's reincarnated father!!

There is more too it all, but it wouldn't be fair to ruin all of the extremity and silliness that abounds here.

I guess the main reason why I liked Henderson the Rain King so much was for how creative and original the story is. You have everything to reincarnated lions to frog explosions. Everything from weird, exotic rain dances to deep friendships and everything in between.

Henderson the Rain King is not a perfect book, of course. It is told in first person, and at times, Henderson can get on our nerves and under our skin, but overall, he comes off as a truly original and complex character. Sometimes the book meanders a bit too much, too often, but who can complain with such an interesting story full of liveliness.

Also, the description is remarkable. I love the way words are formed together to give the reader memorable images about certain events and background that illuminate the entire reading experience. The language is hypnotic and rolls off like an addictive hallucinogen. What a strange, wacky experience this was.

Just don't read too deep into it all. If you don't, you will enjoy the experience. It will definitely give you that inalienable rush that our most peculiar dreams tend to give us. This one is just as peculiar as any of those dreams, I suppose. And I mean that in a good way.

Grade: A-

This is one of the most comic of Bellow's novels, and one of the few that has an apparently non- Jewish hero. The internal cry of his hero Henderson , the 'I want, I want" that drives him to escape himself and search for another kind of world in Africa is the restlessness of the rich American who has everything materially but who seeks something more. Yet there is something likeable as well as comic in the huge and hugely appetited Henderson that gives the book a lighter spirit than Bellow's best works , " Herzog " and "Seize the Day". And it is a wonderfully enjoyable read.

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I am a Bellow fan and have read most of his novels. After a while his books become like old friends. This is an excellent novel, and if Bellow's name was not on the cover you would have a hard time telling that he wrote it. This was written in the 1950s, before his famous and brilliant book "Herzog," and Bellow seems to be experimenting with his writing. This is an excellent read but very different for Bellow. There are no mentions of Jewish roots, and it involves a slightly farfetched story of a macho man, Henderson, wandering around the African wilderness with a gun and camping gear. He manages to integrate himself into two tribes and become friends with one king and his lion. Hence the picture of the lion on the cover. Unlike other Bellow characters, Henderson prizes personal experiences and self confidence above reading and philosophy, but Henderson has a strong emotional side as well. He spars verbally with various African characters in an exchange of values and life experiences. Bellow draws on his study of Africa for the background material and uses a landlord to model the character Henderson.

In case you are new to Bellow, his novels reflect his intellectual life, his writings, and his five marriages during his six active decades of writing. He hit his peak as a writer around the time of "Augie March" in 1953 and continued through to the Pulitzer novel "Humbolt's Gift" in 1973. He wrote from the early 1940s through to 2000. His novels are written in a narrative form, and the main character is a Jewish male, usually a writer but not always, and he is living in either in New York or Chicago. The novels are mostly about urban life and involves his life, the wives, lawyers, judges, accountants, criminals, book publishers, and other peopel. Bellow wrote approximately 13 novels and plus other works.

Bellow's style progressed a long way as a writer over the five decades. Some compare his style in "Dangling Man" - the first novel - with Dostoevsky's "Notes from the Underground." Having read both I would say that "Notes" is brilliant while "Dangling Man" is at best average and sometimes a bit boring. His novels became more colourful such as "Augie March," or brilliant in "Herzog" or expansive and entertaining such as in "Humbolt's Gift." Some of these novels have a warmth and charm, and have a certain tongue in cheek approach in describing the trials and tribulations of the narrator. The humour is mixed in with the meaning of life and the future of our souls. Along the way there are a few diversions such as "Mr. Sammler's Planet" or "The Dean's December" where we see a much more serious individual, but again there is a bit of humour with the character Sammler.

That bring us to the present book, which breaks the form of most of his other novels. This is an early novel. The style is a fast paced and almost light read - compared to the earlier novels. It lacks most of Bellow's trademark features found in the later books. Rather than describing the life of a writer or editor in Chicago or New York, we have the story of a war veteran and pig farmer, who becomes restless and decides on a whim to go to Africa. We still have a divorce and a new wife as in some other books, but the new wife is not the "fashion statement" that we see in later works. What is even more astonishing for Bellow fans is that the character Henderson accomplishes his feats with courage and brute strength, not writing abilities or similar. Henderson is a man of action, who manages to integrate himself into a remote African tribe by wrestling the leader, and then - by the native's standards - doing heroic acts of magic to help different tribes. Perhaps at some distant future date, some Bellow scholar will speculate that Bellow did not even write this novel. It is that different.

This is an entertaining and colourful novel just over 300 pages in length. Unlike some Bellow novels, it is engaging after just a page or two. It completely lacks the urban intellectual sophistication of some of Bellow's other works, but it has its own charm. It is Bellow's only action story. It is a different approach by Bellow in his quest to discover man's soul the through art of writing, to entertain, and to create resonances with the reader.

5 stars.

HENDERSON THE RAIN KING holds a special place in my heart: It is the first novel that was assigned to me in an English class that I didn't think was boring as hell. Not to put down English, it's a valuable course, but sometimes you can't help but wish for a book that's not only 'important', but also 'fun to read'.

HENDERSON follows the titular character through a few months of his life, as he decides to drop everything to travel through Africa. That sums up the plot, but it doesn't do justice to either Saul Bellow's prose, or the character of Henderson himself.

Henderson is an original, a huge mountain of a man who is so full of himself, and yet so full of zeal for life, that you can't help but admire him. Henderson does not go at things half-heartedly. He goes full-bore through life, often leaving innocent bystanders in his wake.

The thing is, Henderson is SO overblown, SO pompous, SO egotistical, that you cannot believe, by the end, that you actually like the guy. This is where Bellow's talent really shines through. He has taken an individual who would tire you out within two minutes in real life, and has somehow made him endearing. It is a terrific feat of writing, on par with John Kennedy Toole's hero Ignatius Reilly in A CONFEDERACY OF DUNCES. Although to be fair, Henderson is not nearly as unlikeable (in theory) as Ignatius is.

HENDERSON is not a saint. Thank God. He'd never let good sense stand in the way of a good time. But he's not an idiot. He does care for others, in his way (unlike Ignatius). He's destructive, but intensely well-meaning. He's one of the most remarkable characters in modern literary fiction, keeping company with Ignatius, Garp, and Quoyle. Those true readers out there know who these guys are.

Not only does Eugene Henderson's journey of discovery touch and teach the reader, but he is an unbelievable buffoon. This is one of the funniest books -- period. Bellow makes Henderson so self-centered, he can't be bothered by details... such as which of his children are in the custody of his ex-wife. She's got one of them, well fine, she can have it, God bless the both of them (or something like that)! Really, Henderson is capable of something great (including great suffering) because he's human, only honest -- plus a few pounds and nose-size. The Counting Crows' _August and Everything After_ includes songs based on this book.