- Paperback: 242 pages
- Publisher: Farrar Straus & Giroux (June 1974)
- ISBN-10: 0374505969
- ISBN-13: 978-0374505967
- Product Dimensions: 20.1 x 13.5 x 1.8 cm
- Shipping Weight: 272 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (69 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #1,699,867 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Amazon
This elegantly written account of a young man's search for signs of purpose in the universe is one of the great existential texts of the postwar era and is really funny besides. Binx Bolling, inveterate cinemaphile, contemplative rake and man of the periphery, tries hedonism and tries doing the right thing, but ultimately finds redemption (or at least the prospect of it) by taking a leap of faith and quite literally embracing what only seems irrational.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Book Description
Binx Bolling, a small-time stockbroker in suburban New Orleans, lives out his days pursuing an interest in the movies and affairs with his secretaries. But one fateful Mardi Gras week, a bizarre series of events leads him on a search for some spiritual truth to anchor him.
--This text refers to the
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First Sentence
This morning I got a note from my aunt asking me to come for lunch. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt
This morning I got a note from my aunt asking me to come for lunch. Read the first page
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Concordance
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Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt
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Most helpful customer reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Go get this one,
This review is from: The Moviegoer (Paperback)
The Moviegoer strikes the perfect balance between ideas and people. He succeeds in writing a book about loneliness and isolation without ever seeming sappy or sentimental; he creates a whole cast of fully developed characters who are deeply flawed but always sympathetic. And one is always struck by the strangeness of the characters. They are absolute originals. I haven't met anyone like Kate in the pages of a novel before or since, but one still somehow relates to every one of them, and can feel connections with their longing for . . . in any case, all of that is irrelevant. It is a great book, I encourage everyone to read it. Also try Jackson McCrae's "Children's Corner" or his "Bark of the Dogwood" for equally great southern reads-intricate and haunting all of these.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Lost on Bourbon Street,
By
This review is from: The Moviegoer (Paperback)
Walker Percy wrote the Moviegoer, a Southern novel with William Faulkner and Truman Capote in mind. The latter writers were certainly more famous though Percy won the National Book Award in 1960. Percy is a Post-Modern, so understand, life or its meaning are lost somewhere on Bourbon Street. Redemption, it's on the silver screen if only it could be captured and held. Binx Dixon is a young man with a good job and a need to believe in something. His cousin by marriage is beautiful but suicidal. If he tells her how to live, then she may bloom again. If only he could figure out what is a moral way to live in the 1950's existential ether. Brilliantly written, the Post-Modern train of thought is forgivable. We want to know if Binx and company can find peace during Mardi Gras.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Subtle and complex,
By A Customer
This review is from: The Moviegoer (Paperback)
Subtle, well-crafted, and entertaining, certainly this multifaceted and edifying story is well worth the reading. The fuel that propels this story is Percy's unique narrative style in using both present and past tenses. Perhaps his medical training or his three years spent in psychoanalysis during his residency had had an influence. At any rate, as the first-person narrator, Binx Bolling's present tense narration draws the reader close in "real time" and be intimate with the former in thought and action. When Bolling finds it necessary to digress or to fill-in the reader on the particulars of the past, he tells it in past tense. But Percy's writing is so good, the two tenses blurred as one. Aspiring writers who struggle with writing in present or past tense should take note. Would also recommend another stellar read, full of psychological and emotional intrigue, that is suspenseful yet well-written---THE BARK OF THE DOGWOOD--A Tour of Southern Homes and Gardens. Enjoy!
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