Suttree (Paperback)

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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Set in Knoxville, Tenn., in the 1950s, this novel tells the story of a man who has repudiated his well-to-do parents, deserted his wife and is now a river fisherman who consorts with robbers, ragmen and other outcasts. "McCarthy captures these people's lives and speech with a tough, lyric grace," PW commented.
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

?Suttree contains a humour that is Faulknerian in its gentle wryness, and a freakish imaginative flair reminiscent of Flannery O'Connor.? ?The Times Literary Supplement (London)

?All of McCarthy?s books present the reviewer with the same welcome difficulty. They are so good that one can hardly say how good they really are. . . . Suttree may be his magnum opus. Its protagonist, Cornelius Suttree, has forsaken his prominent family to live in a dilapidated houseboat among the inhabitants of the demimonde along the banks of the Tennessee River. His associates are mostly criminals of one sort or another, and Suttree is, to say the least, estranged from what might be called normal society. But he is so involved with life (and it with him) that when in the end he takes his leave, the reader?s heart goes with him. Suttree is probably the funniest and most unbearably sad of McCarthy?s books . . . which seem to me unsurpassed in American literature.? ?Stanley Booth


From the Hardcover edition. -- Review

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Product Details

• Paperback: 480 pages
• Publisher: Vintage; Later printing edition (May 5, 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0679736328
• ISBN-13: 978-0679736325
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.2 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (70 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #5,228 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

46 of 51 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars toil under the sun, October 22, 2002

By	Ian K. Hughes (San Mateo, CA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Suttree (Modern Library) (Hardcover)

Prior to reading Cormac McCarthy's "SUTTREE" (1979), my only experience with the author was with his highly touted work, "BLOOD MERIDIAN" (1985). Although the latter work is a unique masterpiece ( utilizing a lightning pace and truly spectacular language ) the breadth and easy flow of "SUTTREE" is completely true to its own quirky nature. Oddly enough, given the stomach churning violence and ( apparent ) triumph of evil portrayed in "BLOOD MERIDIAN", McCarthy's earlier novel is actually the more profoundly sad ( and certainly more humorous ) of the two.

It is fair to speculate that this work was special to McCarthy since he was drawing a portrait of the town and era in which he grew up ( Knoxville, Tennessee in the 1950's ). Others, who are familiar with the work of William Faulkner ( as I am not ) will be better equipped to discuss whether this "southern" novel bears any major resemblance to the late master from Mississippi. My "take" on "SUTTREE" can only come ( as is natural ) from past literary experiences and, perhaps more importantly, a particular "world view". Although stronger and more learned readers will undoubtedly shed more light on the work, I hope nonetheless that the following thoughts will help others reflect on "SUTTREE" and decide for themselves what it's "all about".

After a short and soaring descriptive prelude ( a wasteland grotesquerie ), the novel's namesake Cornelius Suttree is introduced. Appropriately enough, this first glimpse takes place alongside the silent and abused Tennessee River, a Styx-like emblem of eternity running through the mid 20th century "Hades" of Knoxville, where Suttree lives on a rundown houseboat. Suttree's desultory "neutrality" towards existence is mixed with hallucinogenic dreams and flashbacks ( a key "vision" in the wilderness is reminiscent of "Snow" from Thomas Mann's "THE MAGIC MOUNTAIN" ). Seemingly carefree, going about his life in moment-to-moment fashion amidst his derelict companions, Suttree in fact lives completely in his past, haunted by ( among other things ) the memory of his patrician upbringing, failed marriage and a mysteriously significant "other". At times he seems an Old Testament prophet, full of insight and sublimated rage ( a contemporary Qoheleth ), his thoughts and actions reflecting the weary ruminations of a man trapped in hopelessness. Suttree's spiritual quandary is in recognizing that while others in his Knoxville circle seem damned by dint of fate, he himself chooses to live in a kind of purgatory, with the possibility of transcending his lot.

As opposed to the mythological archetypes displayed in "BLOOD MERIDIAN", the quirky and entertaining lost souls so sympathetically rendered in "SUTTREE" are all too human. There are several laugh out loud scenes in the book, many focusing on Suttree's oddball friend Gene Harrogate. Though the humor is intertwined with immense sadness, this aspect of McCarthy's style is a delightful surprise.

"SUTTREE" is a hard but compassionate glimpse at the tragedy and triumph underlying the human drama (a "story" in which we all play a part). On the basis of the two works with which I'm familiar, Cormac McCarthy writes with both purpose and artistry; surely he deserves his reputation as a modern literary master.

24 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Suttree, May 22, 2005

By	johndoe73965 - See all my reviews

This review is from: Suttree (Modern Library) (Hardcover)

Absolutely exquisite. Perhaps that adjective gets overused nowadays, but here it is appropriate - perhaps even not strong enough of a term. "Suttree" is a must must must-read. It is such a profound indictment of the human race that it could be used as evidence against us if we are ever sued by space aliens. When viewed in terms of "Blood Meridian" and all of C McC's pre-Natl Book Award works, his range as an author is revealed and is humbling. The man is our greatest living novelist. I am grateful to him for having offered this work to the world.

42 of 48 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A terrestrial Hell, April 1, 2003

By	Daniel Myers (Greenville, SC USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

I have never used this term in a review, but this is a work of genius. McCarthy's Blood Meridian may have a more taut artistic virtuousity to it, but Suttree rings sprawlingly true to life and love while at the same time delivering the poetic lyricism of the arabesques and grotesqueries of life that stamp McCarthy as the greatest and most visionary writer of our time. Here is the pathos, bitterweetness, and comedy (Can anyone forget Harrogate and the bats, much less his getting off the charge of bestiality because "A mellon ain't no beast"?!?) of being human.-All this delivered in the most magnificent sweeping prose since Lowry (A writer I'd recommend to McCarthy fans) and Faulkner.
But down to some philosophical nuts and bolts: This is a dark novel displaying a visionary medieval mindset, much like Lowry's Under The Volcano (To my mind, the only other novelist of pure genius of this century..). It is the seemingly effortless interweaving of the visionary with the mundane that make this novel so astounding. We are witnesses to page upon page of brilliant poetic lightenings upon a tableau of "a terrestrial hell" as Suttree puts it, a place which not only he, but we all inhabit.

To quote at length: "What deity in the realms of dementia, what rabid god decocted out of the smoking lobes of hydrophobia could have devised a keeping place for souls so poor as this flesh. This mawky wormbent tabernacle."

This is the question this brilliant work thrusts before the reader in page upon glowing page.