I probably found out about Nathanael West & read his 4 short bks when I was in my late teens. What a discovery! I divide his novels into the absurd (these 2) & the 'realistic' ("Miss Lonelyhearts" & "The Day of the Locust") but the delineation is tenuous. All 4 novels are social criticism. "The Dream Life of Balso Snell" is from 1931 & is a slim 60 pages. All I remember of it is that the protagonist finds the Trojan Horse & enters it thru its asshole - finding graffiti along the way. This was my favorite, probably b/c it was the most absurd. "A Cool Million" is West's parody of Horatio Alger stories - you know the ones: the newspaper boy works hard & thru dedication & the reward system of capitalism becomes a successful millionaire businessman. West blows the well-deserved holes thru that one. The subtitle of "A Cool Million" is "The Dismantling of Lemuel Pitkin" & the hero pursues fame & fortune w/ Alger-like naivity, failing every step of the way & gradually losing body parts in the process. 113pp, 1934, set in the depression. ( )

Got some good zingers but it's largely inconsequential. ( )

A novella that starts with a man entering the rear end of the Trojan Horse, and after wandering around in its intestines and meeting various people, ends with a creative description of lovemaking and an orgasm. I don’t think that spoils anything, as the book is not “about” anything, but it gives you sense of how irreverent it is. In this first work of his, West is imaginative and surreal, and also juvenile and scatological. He channels James Joyce a bit, and there are some scenes that had me smiling, such as St. Puce, the flea who lived in the armpit of Jesus Christ. Another was coming across the writer who had decided to write the biography of a biographer of a biographer of a biographer of Boswell. It’s a little uneven, but clever and worth the short read.

Just this quote, actually from Chekhov:
“It would be more profitable for the farmer to raise rats for the granary than for the bourgeois to nourish the artist, who must always be occupied with undermining institutions.” ( )

Wonderful ( )