Rating: 
Summary: for some interesting ideas
Review: this book is captivating only if you have loads of patience to go through all the intellectual material loaded in it by the author. it is not the kind which can be whole heartedly endorsed to everyone. the plot is about Charles Citrine a famous author- now in decline- and his poet-friend Von Humboldt and their internal struggles. like everyone else, Citrine too faces all the common problems of life. these are all encompassing interms of physical (hairloss), material (eluding success, lawsuits and money), emotional (ex-wife, gold- digging girlfriend, ambiguous friends), and intellectual (philistinism, deciline in arts, Humboldt's failure etc). but the most important quest for him is to define consciousness. he is forever struggling with this enigma. he is in search of an answer for the following mysteries of nature. what is this consciousness, is there a spirit and a soul, what do they mean, is there a higher form of consciousness like the spirit, does this consciousness remain after death and if so what are its consequences and so on. he is scared of a conscious entity after death but again if there is none, he argues the futility of a single life. these enquiries of his range from topics like meta-physics to mysticism and spiritualism. though Bellow may not have actually attempted to deal with this subject, it forms the most interesting part of the book. the rest is in the higher realms of intellectualism which one may neither follow nor comprehend. but one is helped in tiding over these parts by Bellow's typical humourous and satirical prose. if you are really hounded by the enquiries mentioned above, then this book will prove an interesting read.
Rating: 
Summary: Pulitzer Prize? My Gawwwwwd.
Review: This book is just one more example of how Pulitzer Prizes and Nobel Prizes don't mean squat. Saul Bellow is not one of the best authors of the 20th century and this book is not or should not be an American classic. Bellow suffers from what I like to call the Heinlien syndrome. He wrote concise short books with good stories at the beginning of his career and then increasingly got sidetracked by ethics, morality, intellectualism, and name-dropping in his works. Not to say a great book can't contain a moral but at least concentrate on the plot and story to support the moral.This book is agonizing to read. There is no straight forward time line. The narrator skips back in forth through time to different events and memories at such a bewildering rate that it becomes a chore just to keep everything straight. That wouldn't be so bad except for the absurd conversations between Von Humboldt and Citrine. Neither of these characters came off as believable to me in the least. The central focus of the book is the relationship between Von Humboldt, a poet, and Citrine, an award winning author but the plot actually takes place after Humboldt's death. Citrine comes off as one of the stupidest intellectuals I have ever had the misfortune of reading about. The all time lamest scene is when Rinaldo, a low level thug, kidnaps Citrine and then forces him into the bathroom at gunpoint while he relieves his bowels. WTF? In short, if you want to read about the depths of the human soul you would be much better off reading Rimbaud, Celine, Sholokov, Hesse, or even Hemingway. Stay away from this author and his pretentious and absurd novels.
Rating:
Summary: Pulitzer Prize? My Gawwwwwd.
Review: This book is just one more example of how Pulitzer Prizes and Nobel Prizes don't mean squat. Saul Bellow is not one of the best authors of the 20th century and this book is not or should not be an American classic. Bellow suffers from what I like to call the Heinlien syndrome. He wrote concise short books with good stories at the beginning of his career and then increasingly got sidetracked by ethics, morality, intellectualism, and name-dropping in his works. Not to say a great book can't contain a moral but at least concentrate on the plot and story to support the moral. This book is agonizing to read. There is no straight forward time line. The narrator skips back in forth through time to different events and memories at such a bewildering rate that it becomes a chore just to keep everything straight. That wouldn't be so bad except for the absurd conversations between Von Humboldt and Citrine. Neither of these characters came off as believable to me in the least. The central focus of the book is the relationship between Von Humboldt, a poet, and Citrine, an award winning author but the plot actually takes place after Humboldt's death. Citrine comes off as one of the stupidest intellectuals I have ever had the misfortune of reading about. The all time lamest scene is when Rinaldo, a low level thug, kidnaps Citrine and then forces him into the bathroom at gunpoint while he relieves his bowels. WTF? In short, if you want to read about the depths of the human soul you would be much better off reading Rimbaud, Celine, Sholokov, Hesse, or even Hemingway. Stay away from this author and his pretentious and absurd novels.
Rating:
Summary: holding the mirror, as 'twere, up to Nature...
Review: This is my first attempt at reading Bellow and I was distinctly underwhelmed at his writing style. It would be nice to round up all our contemporary novelists, sit them in a lecture hall, and explain to them in no uncertain terms that it takes more than Realism and Stream of Consciousness to make a good novel. In Bellow's case, he overdid both techniques.
Rating: 
Summary: Humboldt's Gift is a riot!
Review: This is one of the funniest books I've ever read. Charlie Citrine's many troubles involving friends hoodlums women and the meaning of life will appeal to readers who have realized that they were more or less idiots until about the age of 40. Even if you're still something of an idiot you'll like, and laugh at, this book. Humboldt's Gift proves that Great Literature can be fun to read.
Rating:
Summary: great narrative voice, drawn out story line
Review: This is the first Bellow book I've read and I finished feeling ambivalent about his talents. Humboldt's Gift is the story of a successful writer, Charlie Citrine and his fascination with his friend the poet, Von Humboldt Fleisher. Woven within the text are his relationships with a mobster, several women, and an unreliable literary friend. Citrine is an intellectual and a thinker. Interspersed throughout the story are philosophical thoughts and conjectures about life. Sometimes these further the story or provide more depth to a character, other times they seem like extraneous rambling. The strength of the book is Citrine's strong and unique narrative voice and the portrait of literary and mob life in Chicago, New York and Europe of the 1970s. What disappointed me about the book was that the lack of a strong story line made it difficult to continue reading. I felt the same story could have been told in a few hundred fewer pages. Overall, not a terrible book, but not especially memorable.
Rating:
Summary: great narrative voice, drawn out story line
Review: This is the first Bellow book I've read and I finished feeling ambivalent about his talents. Humboldt's Gift is the story of a successful writer, Charlie Citrine and his fascination with his friend the poet, Von Humboldt Fleisher. Woven within the text are his relationships with a mobster, several women, and an unreliable literary friend. Citrine is an intellectual and a thinker. Interspersed throughout the story are philosophical thoughts and conjectures about life. Sometimes these further the story or provide more depth to a character, other times they seem like extraneous rambling. The strength of the book is Citrine's strong and unique narrative voice and the portrait of literary and mob life in Chicago, New York and Europe of the 1970s. What disappointed me about the book was that the lack of a strong story line made it difficult to continue reading. I felt the same story could have been told in a few hundred fewer pages. Overall, not a terrible book, but not especially memorable.
Rating:
Summary: This is a GREAT book.
Review: This is the first book I have ever read by Saul Bellow. What a book it is!! I strongly recommend it on two levels. First Mr. Bellow is a master of the language. His descriptions are so unique. I am afraid to mention them here because I don't want to spoil them for you. I will share one of my many favorite lines from the book. At one point, he describes an old man as having "a head like a blown dandelion." How on earth did he come up with such a terrific description. This book is filled with lines like that. The book also has a great story. It in fact reminds me of another favorite book "Confederacy of Dunces." This is, in a sense, a more serious look at the same type of character as the main character in "Confederacy of Dunces." Humbolt himself is a provocative character, but then there is the reaction to him by the people around him. It is well worth the read.
Rating:
Summary: Addresses my own thoughts of death.
Review: This novel is a well-fitting companion to those who often nurture thoughts of the meaning of death, e.g., how our knowledge of its certainty affects our daily lives. Charles Citrine is displaced from normalcy at this point in his life and suffers greatly for it. His only excuse is that he spends his time musing over more "important" things than his personal life and finances. He is Humboldt's protege, but he never realizes the same greatness.
Rating: 
Summary: American Literature
Review: This novel won the 1976 Pulitzer Prize for fiction. The author was awarded the Nobel Prize in literature the same year. In reference to some of the other reviews, I would note that readers need to decide whether they want to read literature or to read brain candy. This novel is literature and requires some amount of concentrated thought. The author digresses and backtracks to fill in details of various characters. He also has a tendency to philosophize. It is past page 300 before you actually get to Humboldt's Gift. It took some effort to get into the novel but, once involved, it was worth the effort. Some parts are more interesting than others, especially the parts set in Chicago. Charlie Citrine is a writer who is at a crisis point in his life. His ex-wife is trying to strip him of everything he has. He is in trouble with the IRS over past tax returns. Investments have gone bad. He is threatened by a hoodlum, who really wants Charlie to help his wife on a PhD dissertation. He is having some conflicts with his girlfriend. He is almost out of funds, but everyone thinks he is rich. Charlie had been the protege of the poet Von Humboldt Fleisher. Humboldt had early success, than went downhill. He could be compared to Vincent Van Gogh, i.e., people were not buying his work; he was considered psychotic; and he died in poverty; but is now well regarded after his death. He was not as crazy as people thought, and he leaves a surprising legacy. The novel is a story of Charlie turning his life around, and rebounding to new found fame. He has help from Humboldt from beyond the grave.
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