Naked and the Dead: Amazon.ca: Norman Mailer: Books

Product Description

From Library Journal

This 50th-anniversary edition of Mailer's World War II epic contains a new introduction by the author. If your current copy is falling apart, now is the time to replace it.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.

Review

"Nightmarish masterpiece of realism."--Celeveland News

"The most important American novel since Moby Dick."--Providence Journal

"The best novel to come out of the . . . war, perhaps the best book to come out of any war."--San Francisco Chronicle

"Brutal, agonizing, astonishingly thoughtful."--Newsweek

"Vibrant with life, abundant with real people, full of memorable scenes. To call it merely a great book about the war would be to minimize its total achievement."--The Philadelphia Inquirer

"Best novel yet about World War II."--Time

--This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.

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Customer Reviews

33 Reviews

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(13)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(3)

Average Customer Review

4.0 out of 5 stars (33 customer reviews)

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2.0 out of 5 stars Mailer didn't get it right, April 22 2004

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"pointer_04" (KS) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Naked and the Dead: 50th Anniversary Edition, With a New Introduction by the Author (Paperback)

This book was strikingly similar to The Thin Red Line. The characters, the use of literary techniques, the settings and subsettings all similar. However, Mailer and Jones did not get it right. These books don't tell the true story of war. They certainly dipict physical side of war, the torn land and the carnage, but it is the personal side of war that they miss. In this book Mailer fails to capture the true essence of human nature. Because the fact is people at war depend on each other. Mailer and Jones display the rivalries among the men. Ofcourse, rivalries are common in the young men the write about. Men at war do not often get along together, you always have the jerks and the sadsack, but they bond far more than they compete. No fiction I have read regarding WWII has managed to capture this. The Naked and the Dead is just another example of the dry, monotonous, and even lousy world war fiction that has been written. I truthfully cannot explain all the great reviews on this book, it is very very average. You want to know what it was like, read Stephen Ambrose, Gerald Astor, or Eugene Sledge.

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4.0 out of 5 stars A classic, yet flawed, April 3 2004

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Kirk McElhearn "Freelance writer and translator" (A town in the French Alps) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Naked and the Dead: 50th Anniversary Edition, With a New Introduction by the Author (Paperback)

Mailer's Naked and the Dead is the story of a group of soldiers on an island in the Pacific during world war II, trying to take control of the island. Rather than focus on the macro-elements of the campaign, Mailer gives us an almost cinematic treatment of this platoon of a dozen soldiers, showing us their fears and desires, their foibles and prejudices. With flashbacks (Time Machines) giving the context and past of each of the men, you start to understand them more as the book moves on. By the time the platoon sets out on a reconnaissance patrol, you are familiar with all the main characters.

But the book suffers from over-wordiness at times, especially since so much of it is description of the soldiers' movements and surroundings. The tension among the men could be tauter, and the book could be a hundred pages shorter. But Mailer's gut-punching style, using simple words and sentences, gives an earthy feel to this book, which certainly was more influential when it was released than it is now. It's still a must-read, though.

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2.0 out of 5 stars A Sub-par Three Soldiers, Oct 1 2003

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Vince R. (St Louis, MO) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Naked and the Dead: 50th Anniversary Edition, With a New Introduction by the Author (Paperback)

Mailer's take on war, is just a weak "Three Soldiers" which was written by a much better writer: Dos Passos.
Pass on "The Naked and the Dead",
pick up the real deal: "Three Soldiers".

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