I Am Charlotte Simmons

Rating:
Summary: A disappointment
Review: Because I'm as susceptible to "hype" as the next person, and because I did enjoy "Bonfire of the Vanities" and "A Man in Full" despite their flaws, I looked forward to reading "Charlotte Simmons". But there is a basic flaw in the premise of this book: Charlotte is a brilliant girl, a star of her high school, read deeply in many areas, but hadn't actually prepared for college, it that she hadn't read a bit about how prevalent drugs, alcohol and sexual activity are in colleges today. The book is therefore without surprises except that such a smart, supposedly strong woman would only judge herself by how she is rated in the eyes of men.

Rating:
Summary: Big disappointment
Review: Bonfire of the Vanities was one of my favorite books of the 1980s and I am a college professor so, I was really looking forward to this novel. While it was somewhat engrossing, due primarily to Wolfe's talent as a storyteller, it was overwhelmingly disappointing. First, Wolfe is utterly clueless about what is in the mind of a 18 year old girl. What hubris for a MAN of his age to begin to think he could pull this off. Second, his characters are all banal stereotypes. There is no richness in them and nothing humorous about how they behave (unlike the characters in Bonfire of the Vanities). In addition, the story is completely predictable. There are no surprises. By the end of the book I was just reading to get it over with. Maybe he thought all the sex and sex and sex would shock people enough that they wouldn't notice how shallow the rest of the book was. I'm not even sure he understands what is going on with youth sexuality. What he wrote about has been going on since I was in college 25 years ago! In sum, I expected a great read from Wolfe and he did not deliver.

Rating:
Summary: Tom Wolfe MUST be read
Review: Don't let the three star rating fool you. This is a must read book...it's just not a GREAT book nor is it as powerful a piece of social criticism as "Bonfire" or as well told a story as "Man in Full". That said, it's still damn good.

I find Wolfe amazing in his capacity to capture the significance and irony of nearly any situation. But how a 70 year old man can portray, accurately as far as I can tell, the culture and feeling of a college campus is a feat beyond reckoning. Even though the generation of college students in "Charlotte Simmons" is a generation removed from mine, I recognized their (only) slightly less decadent counterparts in my own college experiences.

I suppose the weakness here, when compared to his previous novels, revolves around the main characters. They just don't seem as fully fleshed out. Perhaps that is as it should be since none of us is nearly as interesting at 18 as we are at 30, 40, 50 and onwards.

Rating:
Summary: Class, Status, and Power
Review: I am a big Tom Wolfe fan, but all the reviews statingthat the books was only about out of control college kids screwing like rabbits almost convinced me to skip this one. Like most great novels the reader can chose how deeply or superficially to puruse the book. One can read it simply as a page turner. Wolfe offers much more. He investigated elite colleges first hand before writing the book. Thus the reader gets social cultural descriptions of 'our best', our pre-ordained 'masters of the universe'. Wolfe is hilarious in exposing the values and behaviors of the sorority sisters and the frats. In fact there are too many memorable scenes to mention. Wolfe turns race relations upside down, examines big time college athletes, or student-athletes, economic and social class, and university culture. The book raises many questions, and gives the reader a lot to think about. Most negative reviewers seem to take this book personally. Some get hung up on Charlotte's virginity which is really a character issue or choice. The book is about human beings, it has universal meanings and themes that are important to think about. The writing is, well its Tom Wolfe. If you want to read a book that will become a classic and still be around 50 years from now, from our national treasure, Tom Wolfe, our Mark Twain and Dickens, read, really read the book. If all you want to do is focus on reporting of sexual mores you can do that as well. If you really get upset that a female character choses sexual abstanance then you may agree with the professional reviewers. If you are stringently politically correct and can't take critques of 'sacred cows' then this book may upset you.


Rating:
Summary: Q&D Take on Wolfe's Latest Novel//jk
Review: Q&D Take on Wolfe's Latest Novel

Wolfe's simple declarative sentences
interspersed with redundant caresses
pause page-turning, rage-burning, sage-learning
often enough to engage this reader
who wonders: why I am reading this book?

His preface-hook seems truly transparent
such, awful outcomes ought be no surprise;

italics emphasize when static stalls;
all-caps-bold vies with whispers during shouts;

I endure iterations of jock-jerk
for Wolfe's words compel praise of his art-work;

his costumes carry the actors stories;
his pincers decry progressive glories;

the brilliant parts comprise the whole magilla;
one overlooks the proofing errors, ha!

an unsympathetic heroine proves
the point posited in the preamble--
exposure has the same effect on "cool"
as hot-not-trot does on mindless jewels;

her conscious rock is unaware of what
compromises conscience and colors code,
but it assimilates for survival,
adopts a new "toxic pose" of She, first.

Her user was very carefully taught;
(she'll emulate Hoyt's successful-savvy)
she'll be saved from depression by Adam,
of course, an Adam! who sees only Eve.

Adam fancies himself a snake-killer;
he misses the ripe apple named Jo-Jo
who picks a peeler named Charlotte Simmons,
but he'll hurt Hoyt as a vengeful wolf-tom might.

Wolfe's wit wounds all winners but the reader;
once begun, the book cannot be cast down;
between racing to know when happens next
and being bored with two sets of down-ups;
this reader learned: awe beats anger at nice.

Jeanne Khan who reads one fiction a year...;>
9 February 2005



Rating:
Summary: Wall Street Journal on Pres. Bush reading Charlotte Simmons
Review: Reading the President
February 9, 2005; Page A10

Ever since John F. Kennedy confessed that Ian Fleming's "From Russia With Love" was one of his favorite books, journalists and historians have paid close attention to Presidential reading lists, searching for clues of taste, intellect and character. So what does President Bush's reading list say about him?

Much of the list is not a surprise. The President talks a lot about the need to spread democracy in the Middle East, so it's only natural that he should have read and admired Natan Sharansky's "The Case For Democracy." The same goes for Ron Chernow's biography of Alexander Hamilton, which is all about what it takes to build a republic.

What is perhaps surprising is news that the President is a big fan of "I Am Charlotte Simmons," Tom Wolfe's latest doorstop of an entertainment. Now, why is that?

One reaction is to raise an eyebrow that this supposed Puritan of a President should indulge such titillating fiction: Mr. Wolfe's book, which deals with the assorted undergraduate debaucheries of fictional Dupont University, contains a chapter-long sex scene. Or perhaps the President, whose twin daughters are real-life contemporaries of Charlotte Simmons, read the book out of fatherly concern. Or maybe Mr. Bush, a "Deke" man at Yale, just wanted to relive his Animal House days.

Our reaction is a little different. For starters, it's hard to credit the idea that Mr. Bush is a cretin when Mr. Wolfe is a favorite author. On the contrary, both men have succeeded largely because they are in touch with the kinds of cultural currents the liberal establishment rarely notices (or considers beneath notice). Mr. Wolfe himself noted just before the election that "I would vote for Bush if for no other reason than to be at the airport waving off all the people who say they are going to London if he wins again."

It also strikes us that the President, who in his State of the Union address spoke of the "long journey" his Boomer generation had taken to "come home to family and faith," saw "Charlotte Simmons" as a morality play. A morality play about what? Well, if Mr. Wolfe's "Bonfire of the Vanities" was a call for the revival of WASP values and "A Man In Full" was a call for the revival of Roman stoicism, "Charlotte Simmons" would seem to be a call for a revival of Victorian modesty and seriousness of purpose.

It's always possible we're reading too much into this, but in any event, as lists go, Mr. Bush could do a lot worse.

Rating:
Summary: Hard-Hitting Social Commentary
Review: The fictional Dupont University, showing similarities to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and to Stanford, is the setting for another Topm Wolfe masterpiece, "I am Charlotte Simmons." Charlotte Simmons is a brilliant but naïve, nearly destitute young woman from the remote hills of North Carolina who wins a full scholarship to attend Dupont. That is about all the background necessary for Tom Wolfe to launch into another of his trademarked acerbic dissections of American society, this time aimed at the various strata of university life. Wolfe is not here to judge or advance his own agenda - only to observe. But no target is left unscathed by his rapier wit and his unique ability to expose the irony and inanity of any number of the sacred cows of higher eductaion. Whether it is the hypocrisy of NCAA basketball, the shallow social stratification of fraternity boys and sorority girls, or the sanctimony of the left wing university educratic establishment, all are dispassionately skewered by Wolfe's blistering prose. Even sweet young Charlotte, as she gradually succumbs to the pressures she initially abhors, suffers under Wolfe's inescapable eye. And while she recovers the individuality that made her once so unique and desirable, Wolfe includes in the "new" Charlotte shell of cynicism thick enough to insure she'll never again accept nor be accepted by her humble mountain roots. At some times darkly humorous and at others depressing, "I am Charlotte Simmons" is at all times entertaining; a revealing and powerful expose of campus life in 21st century America. Like "Bonfire of the Vanities" and "A Man in Full" before it, the treasure of "Charlotte" is not in the final destination, but in the journey as seen through Wolfe's keen eye along the way. Tom Wolfe may be America's most insightful chronicler modern society, and "Charlotte Simmons" is another example of the master at the top of his game. Don't miss it.

Rating:
Summary: OK Book
Review: These are all things that I do regularly in college. It's not a big deal. Everyone does it! I guess I was expecting more than I got out of the book. The System by Roy Valentine is a better book on college sex, partying etc. But don't worry about Charlotte Simmons - she'll grow up to be a good boring desperate housewife like she was taught before going off to college.

Rating:
Summary: My Name is Charlotte Simmons
Review: This book is tedious at best. It was apparently not edited by either the author or his editor. It might have been interesting if it had been edited IN HALF. As it is, it deteriorates to redundant dribble. How could any respectable publishing house allow such self indulgent ranting go on and on and on.
I'd recommend anyone interested wait for a very well abridged audiobook to come out.

Rating:
Summary: Not bad, but I've read better
Review: Tom Wolfe has written some wonderful books, and the reviewers of this one get it close to right. College in any generation is far more interesting than a mere chronicle of modern day malaise. It is about the angst of coming of age, and the uncertainties of adulthood. But let's face it, Tom Wolfe isn't trying to be JD Salinger, he's more of a journalist turned social commentator. For the best book I've read on college life, check out The Big Kids by Robert Hennemuth. It's a great read.