Compulsion (Paperback)

~ (Author) "NOTHING ever ends..." (more)
Key Phrases: ransom letter, defence table, friendly judge, Judd Steiner, Judah Steiner, Artie Straus (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

"Before, we had thought the boys could only have committed the murder under some sudden dreadful impulse. But now we learned how the deed had been marked by a long design developed in full detail. What was new to us was this entry into the dark, vast area of death as an abstraction." The mid-'20s Leopold-Loeb case, called "the crime of the century," introduced Americans to a new type of murder: two privileged college students picked a child at random and killed him without a conventional motive, simply as an intellectual experiment. Meyer Levin's 1956 novel is historical fiction in the tradition of Theodore Dreiser's An American Tragedy--both a compelling story and a meticulous analysis of the different psychologies of the two youths. Compulsion was called "a masterly achievement in literary craftsmanship" by Earle Stanley Gardner in the New York Times Book Review, and it inspired an award-winning film starring Orson Welles as Clarence Darrow.

Product Description

The basis of the award-winning film starring Orson Welles, Compulsion gives a shocking fictionalized account of the Leopold-Loeb murder case--in which two young graduates of the University of Chicago kidnapped and killed a child for the intellectual challenge. "A graphic and absorbing reconstruction of an infamous crime."--Saturday Review.

Product Details

• Paperback: 412 pages
• Publisher: Carroll & Graf Publishers (April 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0786703199
• ISBN-13: 978-0786703197
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.5 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #245,409 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Superb Abnormal Psychology and the Judiciary, December 21, 1999

By	K.Goldberg (Chicago) - See all my reviews

I enjoyed Meyer Levin's sentimental and fictional account of the 1924 Leopold-Loeb murder of Bobby Franks as a fascinating study of abnormal psychology and the judiciary. A former classmate of the killers at the University of Chicago, the author's sympathetic treatment of likely psychopath Leopold ("Judd") may have aided the latter's parole in 1958 (Loeb was killed in prison). Nevertheless, Leopold sued the author over this book. Compulsion is a great novel, but for a starkly realistic view of this brutal crime readers should consult Hal Higdon's superb non-fictional account, Leopold and Loeb: Crime of the Century.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating. Dramatized history; a study of evil., February 23, 2001

By	David Rolfe (Pasadena, CA USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This book is a novelization of the infamous Loeb & Leopold murder case of 1924. The murder was considered at the time to be the crime of the century (like O.J. Simpson was to us). Why would a pair of rich young geniuses kill a randomly selected child? This is a fascinating psychological study of evil. Levin knew the perpetrators personally, so he was in a strong position to tell this story. And he has a brilliant writer's ability to get inside the head of a human being who has lost his way, morally speaking. The book is old and the story is old, but the tale remains relevant and powerful.

Factoid #1: It was made into a movie, "Compulsion", with Orson Welles. The murder also inspired a play and a Hitchcock movie based upon that play (which pre-date this book), "Rope". And yet a third movie (which I didn't "get"): "Swoon".

Factoid #2: Levin opens the book with this line: "Nothing ever ends, and if we retrace every link in causation, it seems there is nowhere a beginning." That's a succinct, intriguing observation, isn't it?

Factoid #3: This book was written in 1956, long after the crime and trial. Levin decided to tell the tale at that point because Leopold, still in prison, was being considered for parole, and it seemed appropriate for the case to be revisited.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A fascinating and beautifully written novel, August 20, 2005

By	Alliterati (New Haven) - See all my reviews

It seems that half of the reviewers here seem either set on critiquing this novel against the actual Leopold/Loeb history, or at least on demonstrating their own knowledge of the case. I'm also a huge follower of the history--but Compulsion is ultimately a work of fiction, a novel. And it happens to be a wonderfully structured, beautifully styled, moving, and psychologically staggering novel. Personal interpretations of characters and historical quibbles aside, Meyer Levin has simply written a lovely work. Judd is an absolutely fascinating protagonist--a true antihero, a complex and stunningly candid literary voice whom you can despise even at his best and adore even at his worst. Artie is admittedly a much more superficial character, but a close reading of the narrative will show that he has more depth than Sid, the narrator himself, would assume. And the relationship between the two boys is the most grotesquely beautiful bond I've had the luck to read since Nabokov's Lolita (and yes, I realize how outrageous such a comparison sounds--but I stand by it!).

Meyer's style has been criticized, but I admire the innovation and the daring of his writing. He manages to mix an exquisitve sophistication and artistry of style with a very casual colloquialism. Yes, the more vernacular passages may date this book to the fifties--and moreover back to the twenties--but that's exactly part of its appeal: to capure the thoughts and words of these boys with historical and cultural intergrity, without any stylistic pretensions to textbook English, and to make us accept that dialect as our own.

This is not to say I think the book is perfect. I would reemphasize that Artie should have been portrayed with more interest, and the politics behind the book are fairly antiquated at this point. (For one thing, the narrator seems to take Sigmund Freud's theories incredibly seriously, and functions on the assumption that his audience does, too. Definitely something I hadn't guessed about the fifties. There are also some problematic assumptions about homosexuality as a curable pathology, made of course in the spirit of the most progressive and liberal medical austerity.) Also, Sid unfortunately pales as a character against Judd, which makes certain scenes with him a bit tedious--rather ironic, considering that he is our window into Judd's psychology to begin with. But I'd personally have to say that 'paling against Judd' isn't really such an insult. And whatever the politics of the psychonanalysis in the novel--certainly whatever your views as to the validity of Levin's conclusions--it's impossible to deny that Levin's psychological interpretations of the case are a marvelously clever and intriguing piece of literature.

Over all, if you're expecting an incredibly conservative documentary of the case, or a book that captures Leopold and Loeb exactly as you see them, of course you'll probably be disappointed. But if you read Levin's take on the murder as exactly that--*Levin's* take--you may find in Compulsion a gem of a novel. I only regret that this book is not more popularly known--I found it to be a gift of a read.