Product Description

A twentieth-century classic, Appointment in Samarra is the first and most widely read book by the writer Fran Leibowitz called “the real F. Scott Fitzgerald.”

In December 1930, just before Christmas, the Gibbsville social circuit is electrified with parties and dances, where the music plays late into the night and the liquor flows freely. At the center of the social elite stand Julian and Caroline English—the envy of friends and strangers alike. But in one rash moment born inside a highball glass, Julian breaks with polite society and begins a rapid descent toward self-destruction. Appointment in Samarra brilliantly captures the personal politics and easy bitterness of small-town life. It is John O’Hara’s crowning achievement, and a lasting testament to the keen social intelligence of a major American novelist.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #84413 in Books
• Published on: 2003-07-08
• Released on: 2003-07-08
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 272 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9780375719202
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
• Click here to view our Condition Guide and Shipping Prices

Review
"Exceptionally brilliant." --"New York Herald Tribune
""[O'Hara] is the only American writer to whom America presents itself as a social scene in the way it once presented itself to Henry James, or France to Proust." --Lionel Trilling, "The New York Times
""Dramatic . . . exciting . . . vivid and written at high speed . . . accurate and often penetrating." --"The Nation
""If you want to read a book by a man who knows exactly what he is writing about and has written it marvelously well, read Appointment in Samarra,""" --Ernest Hemingway

Review
“Exceptionally brilliant.” —New York Herald Tribune

“[O'Hara] is the only American writer to whom America presents itself as a social scene in the way it once presented itself to Henry James, or France to Proust.” —Lionel Trilling, The New York Times

“Dramatic . . . exciting . . . vivid and written at high speed . . . accurate and often penetrating.” —The Nation

“If you want to read a book by a man who knows exactly what he is writing about and has written it marvelously well, read Appointment in Samarra.” —Ernest Hemingway

From the Back Cover
“Exceptionally brilliant.” —New York Herald Tribune

“[O'Hara] is the only American writer to whom America presents itself as a social scene in the way it once presented itself to Henry James, or France to Proust.” —Lionel Trilling, The New York Times

“Dramatic . . . exciting . . . vivid and written at high speed . . . accurate and often penetrating.” —The Nation

“If you want to read a book by a man who knows exactly what he is writing about and has written it marvelously well, read Appointment in Samarra.” —Ernest Hemingway

Customer Reviews

A Must Read American Author
Fitzgerald, Hemingway, C.S.Lewis, John Cheever. If any one of these authors was ever important to you, please pick up O'Hara. He's critical to understanding twentieth century American authors. At the very least, you can engage in the unending debate on whether he's worthy of joining this pantheon of writers. Worthy of an airport paperback rack? Smalltime trashy romance writer? Or do you think he paints a richly textured canvas of an America and its high society about to be turn the corner on the first half of the 20th century? An important Irish-Catholic writer?

My tip: read this book. If nothing else you'll learn about bituminous and anthracitic coal, the United Mine Workers, how to mix a martini, (and throw one), why fraternities were ever important, and what a flivver was. It's certainly a period piece, and O'Hara does not hold back with the language of the jazz age...which may confuse modern readers (it was a gay party, his chains dropped a link, etc.) In fact, O'Hara was an early adopter of using slang and vernacular in writing the spoken word, and you can be the judge of whether or not he gets an Irish mobster's (or a "high hat's") tone correctly.

He's really at his best with character development, because Julian English (our protaganist) is our bigoted confidante, our tiresome spouse, our wretched boss, our surly neighbor, our spoiled college-boy brat, our pretentious friend and our preening big man about town all in one. O'Hara waltzes us through Julian's demise and we root for him, for one more chance, all the way down.

But Who Has the Appointment?
The title comes from a tale attributed to Somerset Maugham (reprinted just in front of the first page of my edition). As story goes, the servant of a merchant in Baghdad sees Death in the marketplace, is sure she's coming for him, and asks permission to go hide from her in the town of Samarra. The merchant agrees, but then goes to the marketplace himself to have some words with Death about how she treated his servant. (I wish I had a boss like that!) Death denies having threatened the man, "I was astonished to see him in Baghdad, for I had an appointment with him tonight in Samarra."

From the very beginning, then, we know that the novel concerns someone with an inevitable appointment with Death which he/she cannot escape. Within a few pages, we even know who. Only the particulars remain - or so it would seem.

Julian English does make his appointment with Death, but the author deliberately destroys the impression of inevitability he spent most of the novel creating. Up to the very end, we believe that Julian's impulsive act of throwing a drink into the face of Harry Reilly, his most important creditor, sealed his fate. We, together with Julian, believe that his alienating Reilly leads inevitably to Julian's financial ruin, and, seeing no way out, Julian commits a series of ever more self-destructive acts culminating in his suicide.

And then we learn that Harry Reilly attached no significance to the thrown drink and that he liked Julian all along. Julian's death was not inevitable after all. Also, far from trying to flee his fate, Julian rushes headlong into it, leading one to conclude that Julian isn't the one with the appointment in Samarra after all.

At first that seems absurd - Julian is the central character of the novel, after all. But Julian isn't actually the center of the novel - the people of Gibbsville are. We learn all about the state of Gibbsville in 1930, meeting about fifty different characters from all walks of life - incredible in such a short (240 pages) novel. O'Hara's has no sympathy for the upper classes, and he depicts their society as decadent, corrupt and declining - people who try to pretend that nothing has happened despite the Crash of 1929 and the loss of the coal market, even as a new generation of entrepreneurs like Harry Reilly displaces them. They don't deserve the fine things they have, nor will they keep them much longer

O'Hara shows his real sympathies in the short segments about Luther L. Fleigler and his wife at the beginning and ending of the book. Luther works for Julian's Cadillac dealership, and just as his hard work contrasts with the sloth of the upper classes, so too his happy relationship with his wife contrasts starkly with Julian and Caroline's poisoned marriage. The future belongs to them.

A Great American Novel.
�Appointment in Samarra� is a great novel. I was led to read it by an article in the Atlantic Monthly that lamented the pretentiousness of much of contemporary writing. Not only is the writing pretentious, but it doesn�t say anything intelligible. �Appointment in Sammara�, by contrast, tells a story in a direct manner while still revealing to us hidden truths about the human spirit. It�s not giving anything away to say that the story concerns the self-destruction of one Julian English. Julian is suave, Protestant, lives in the finest neighborhood, and hangs out with the in crowd. But Julian makes the mistake of throwing his drink into the face of a powerful, nouveau riche Irish Catholic. Suddenly, Julian�s support structures don�t seem so firm. Julian�s descent is heart breaking because, although he is not an especially likeable person, John O�Hara still manages to make us care for him. O�Hara�s book was prophetic in that it portrays the end of WASP domination in America. The book takes place in 1930 and was published in 1934 � just six years after the Catholic Al Smith was denied the presidency by a virulent anti-Catholic backlash led, in part, by the Klan. We're told that some of the locals in Pottsville are members of the the Klan. Twenty-six years later, in 1960, an Irish Catholic would be elected president. Appointment in Samarra is a must read for those who are serious about the American novel.