Tom Wolfe's singular brand of commentary reached it sharp, devastating pinnacle in this biting portrait of that pitiable creature - the wealthy white liberal. With verve, a strong metaphorical flourish, and a ready ability to move the story forward, Wolfe finely details a party that was intended to embody the ethos of an era, and unwittingly did.
This party on January 14, 1970 (Woodstock and the flag on the moon are dissipating euphorium; Altamont is a fresh bruise) brings crafty, radical, violent Black Panthers into the lair of America's great conductor Leonard Bernstein for a fund-raiser.
It's all here: the saccharine philosophizing, the goofy earnestness, the willful suspension of reasoning, even the seeds of the increasingly acrimonious relationship between America's blacks and Jews.
Wolfe adroitly draws the scene for us:
"[Black Panther speaker] Cox seizes the moment: `Our Minister of Defense, Huey P. Newton, has said if we can't find a meaningful life.. you know... maybe we can have a meaningful death... and one reason the power structure fears the Black Panthers is that they know the Black Panthers are ready to die for what they believe in, and a lot of us have already died.'
Lenny seems like a changed man. He looks up at Cox and says, `When you walk into this house, into this building' - and he gestures vaguely as if to take it all in, the moldings, the sconces, the Roquefort morsels rolled in crushed nuts, the servants, the elevator attendant and the doormen downstairs in their white dickeys, the marble lobby, the brass struts on the marquee out front - "when you walk into this house, you must feel infuriated!'
Cox looks embarrasses. `No, man... I manage to overcome that... That's a personal thing...'...
`Well,' says Lenny, `it makes me mad!'
The self-loathing, the fashionable decrial of one's own self, yet the never quite-so-brave as to deny it. As this is a short, short work, I can't reveal too much more without giving away the entire plotline, which is awfully enjoyable for you to watch unfold.
I will say that this is Tom Wolfe writing at its boldest, full-throated best. Wolfe has a way of fetishizing a particular object and using it to illuminate the differences among his subjects. He does this to great effect here with the "Roquefort morsels rolled in crushed crumbs" mentioned above, and it is a delight to watch this talented polemicist run this device through its paces.
All the blurbs on the back of this book deem this a "sociological" work, which must have been a Word-in-Vogue at the time of its publishing. This is a hell of a lot more interesting than any sociology, and more important in its way too.
Now, let's be clear on what you're getting here - this is basically a long magazine article that even with small book format, generous margins and gutter-sized line spacing only runs to four score and two pages. Hence the need to include the entirely adequate "Mau-mauing the Flak-catchers" to bulk it up to a more decorous triple-digit page count.
Nonetheless, this is an enjoyable, easy-breezy read that you can knock off on a short plane ride. I read it in conjunction with Painted Word and From Bauhaus to Our House over a weekend, and I'd suggest getting all three.
This is probably Wolfe's best work as a pamphleteer and certainly his most famous. A fine, devious, dramatic work, this little tome will please the lover of politics, culture, gossip or Americana immensely.
