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The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter (Oprah's Book Club)

The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter (Oprah's Book Club)
By Carson McCullers

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Product Description

With the publication of her first novel, THE HEART IS A LONELY HUNTER, Carson McCullers, all of twenty-three, became a literary sensation. With its profound sense of moral isolation and its compassionate glimpses into its characters' inner lives, the novel is considered McCullers' finest work, an enduring masterpiece first published by Houghton Mifflin in 1940. At its center is the deaf-mute John Singer, who becomes the confidant for all various types of misfits in a Georgia mill town during the 1930s. Each one yearns for escape from small town life. When Singer's mute companion goes insane, Singer moves into the Kelly house, where Mick Kelly, the book's heroine (and loosely based on McCullers), finds solace in her music. Wonderfully attune to the spiritual isolation that underlies the human condition, and with a deft sense for racial tensions in the South, McCullers spins a haunting, unforgettable story that gives voice to the rejected, the forgotten, and the mistreated -- and, through Mick Kelly, gives voice to the quiet, intensely personal search for beauty.
Richard Wright praised Carson McCullers for her ability "to rise above the pressures of her environment and embrace white and black humanity in one sweep of apprehension and tenderness." She writes "with a sweep and certainty that are overwhelming," said the NEW YORK TIMES. McCullers became an overnight literary sensation, but her novel has endured, just as timely and powerful today as when it was first published. THE HEART IS A LONELY HUNTER is Carson McCullers at her most compassionate, endearing best.

Product Details

  • Amazon Sales Rank: #15209 in Books
  • Published on: 2004-04-21
  • Released on: 2004-04-21
  • Original language: English
  • Number of items: 1
  • Binding: Paperback
  • 368 pages

Features

Editorial Reviews

Review

“To me the most impressive aspect of THE HEART IS A LONELY HUNTER is the astonishing humanity that enables a white writer, for the first time in Southern fiction, to handle Negro characters with as much ease and justice of those of her own race. This cannot be accounted for stylistically or politically; it seems to stem from an attitude toward life.” -- Richard Wright

"When one puts [this book] down, it is with . . . a feeling of having been nourished by the truth." --May Sarton

"A remarkable book . . . [McCullers] writes with a sweep and certainty that are overwhelming." The New York Times

"Quite remarkable . . . McCullers leaves her characters hauntingly engraved in the reader's memory." The Nation

"To me the most impressive aspect of 'The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter' is the astonishing humanity that enables a white writer, for the first time in Southern fiction, to handle Negro characters with as much ease and justice as those of her own race." -- Richard Wright New Republic

"One cannot help remarking that this is an extraordinary novel to have been written by a young woman of twenty-two; but the more important fact is that it is an extraordinary novel in its own right, considerations of authorship apart." -- Saturday Review of Literature Saturday Review

"The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter has remarkable power, sweep and certainty . . . Her art suggests a Van Gogh painting peopled with Faulkner figures." The New York Times Book Review

"Sensitively conceived and expertly told . . . Its quality as writing and the intensity of its theme combine to make it one of the outstanding novels of recent years." --Times-Picayune

"Besides telling a good story, the author has peopled it with a small group of characters so powerfully drawn as to linger long in memory." Philadelphia Inquirer

"[McCullers] writes with a calm and factual realism, and with a deep and abiding insight into human psychology. She does so without an iota of vulgarity and bawdiness, in a manner which many a present day novelist would do well to study." Boston Globe

"There is not only the delicately sensed need that one might expect youth to know but an even more delicately sensed ironic knowledge." The Chicago Tribune

"The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter is a miracle of compassion, pity, and irony. Form and matter are perfectly blended in the novel." --Virginia Quarterly Review

From the Inside Flap
When she was only twenty-three, Carson  McCullers's first novel created a literary sensation. She  was very special, one of America's superlative  writers who conjures up a vision of existence as  terrible as it is real, who takes us on shattering  voyages into the depths of the spiritual isolation  that underlies the human condition. This novel is  the work of a supreme artist, Carson McCullers's  enduring masterpiece. The heroine is the strange  young girl, Mick Kelly. The setting is a small  Southern town, the cosmos universal and eternal.  The characters are the damned, the voiceless, the  rejected. Some fight their loneliness with  violence and depravity, Some with sex or drink, and some  -- like Mick -- with a quiet, intensely personal  search for beauty.

About the Author

Carson McCullers (1917-1967) was the author of numerous works of fiction and nonfiction, including The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, The Member of the Wedding, Reflections in a Golden Eye, and Clock Without Hands. Born in Columbus, Georgia, on February 19, 1917, she became a promising pianist and enrolled in the Juilliard School of Music in New York when she was seventeen, but lacking money for tuition, she never attended classes. Instead she studied writing at Columbia University, which ultimately led to The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter, the novel that made her an overnight literary sensation. On September 29, 1967, at age fifty, she died in Nyack, New York, where she is buried.

Customer Reviews

Brilliant5
This book is huge. I approached it with skepticism. Half way through the book, I wasn't wowed. Then while I was telling somebody else about it, it dawned on me how deep the characters and the story had grown. It's a coming of age story for a whole town and one young girl. Every character is so natural through the story that a rich diversity of music, politics, philosophy, and religion is subtly and radically revealed.

Mick Kelly's experiences at her "prom" and the swimming hole, her relationships with her siblings, and obsession with music provide a parallel for the life of each other person. A deaf-mute as a focus to share a secret with each character was inspired. We're all individuals in the same boat. The abrupt last sentence of Part 2 is brilliant.

It's a simple story to enjoy with plenty to discover and digest throughout.

many shades of gray3
Besides this book, I have read "A Member of the Wedding" by Carson McCullers. It is very striking to me that when I read each of these books, my mental images of the characters and settings were in black and white. Well, really, I saw it all play out in shades of gray. The people and places in this book are dark, often dirty, lowly, depressed, depressing and teetering on the verge of hopelessness.

The title aptly states the novel's theme; the overriding feeling of the book is stark loneliness. The characters cannot connect with one another - even when they are trying very hard to do so. They don't have authentic relationships even when they think that they have found a soul mate. Each of them wants to share his or her inner-most truths, and without exception they are impotent in their attempts. They each have things that they want to do, talents that they want to express. In each case, they can't or don't overcome their personal burdens to reach their goals or to achieve any sort of success. In the end, they are each alone with little hope for a more fullfilling life.

The book is very well written. Each chapter is written as a stream of consciousness of one of 4 main characters who each move the story forward a (very tiny) bit. This book is all about characters. It is definitely NOT about plot. McCullers remains stylistically consistent throughout, which seems to be quite an accomplishment in this very ambitious first novel.

For me, reading this book is a literary accomplishment. I can check off another classic from my list of books to read. However, it was not a book that I found enjoyable. I would suggest that ambitious readers should tackle it. Its style, mood and characters are very effectively created and sustained. On the other hand, if you prefer plot, uplifting or hopeful themes, happy endings or characters that grow or overcome their limitations, you may not want to spend your reading efforts on this book.

This is a great book5
The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter is one of the best novels I've read in a while. I loved the way Carson McCullers develops the characters in this book. Loneliness and racial injustice are two timeless themes in this novel that McCullers presents so well. McCullers was a white woman writing about how black people were mistreated and felt oppressed in 1940. She was an author truly ahead of her time in that way.

All the characters are so memorable in this book. Biff Brannon is a compassionate cafe owner. He helps anyone in need by giving them either food, money or a job. Brannon becomes a widower when his wife dies suddenly of a tumor. Mick Kelly is a lonely but intelligent 12 year old girl from a poor family with a passion for music. Doctor Copeland is a black physician. He becomes a crusader for racial justice when his son goes to jail. McCullers explains the basic principles of Karl Marx's economic theory in the novel by putting in a lecture by Copeland in the novel to show how society is divided between the rich and poor people. I knew nothing about Karl Marx's ideas, so I thought this part of the novel was very interesting. Another memorable character is John Singer. He is a man who does not have the ability to speak. However, he becomes the person all the characters eventually confide all their problems to. Singer communicates with his long time room mate and only deaf friend by using sign language. The relationship and love between these two deaf friends is one of the best things about this novel.

The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter is one of the best books Oprah has ever chosen for her book club. The themes of loneliness and racial injustice are timeless and universal. The characters are very memorable too. I loved reading this book.