Billy Bathegate By EL Doctorow Essay Research

Billy Bathegate By E.L. Doctorow Essay, Research Paper

Billy Bathgate is an important American novel in it’s portrayal of one young man’s evolution from boyhood to maturity. The novel is about a fifteen year old boy that gets taken under the wing of Dutch Schultz, a 1930’s gangster trying to keep a hold of his diminishing empire. As the novel unfolds, so does the rising maturity of the tough young man introduced to us as Billy Bathgate. Billy finds himself in situations that most of us never see in our whole life. In difference to the reactions that most people would have in these situations, Billy learns from them in order to better his role in the crime family. It is for these reasons that the young fifteen year old boy quickly develops into a man.

Author Overview

The novel was written in 1989 by a contemporaneous author named E. L. Doctorow. Doctorow was born in 1931 and fantasized about the 1930’s crime life as a child. He is an American novelist, short story writer, editor, essayist, as

well as a dramatist. His works include Big as Life, The Book of Daniel, Ragtime, Loon Lake, World’s Fair, , Lives of the Poets: Six Stories and a Novella, a play entitled Drinks Before Dinner and of course his most recent work Billy Bathgate. Billy Bathgate is Doctorow’s most famous piece of

literature. In fact, the book grasped so much attention that it was later made into a movie with an all star cast including Bruce Willis, Dustin Hoffman and Nicole Kidman. Although the film left out a lot of detail, as so many movies based on novels tend to do, it was interesting to see the elaborate detail given to the clothing, attitude, and backdrop that so accurately reflect the inner city Bronx in the 1930’s. Doctorow’s explicit, graphic detail show his almost fascination with crime and murder. He almost glamorizes the life of crime in Billy Bathgate.

Critical Analisys

Although Billy Bathgate was written quite recently, there is an influx of critical opinion reflecting the admiration of Doctorow’s artistry in literature. “Critics

marveled at Doctorow’s vivid description of New York City in the 1930’s and of the horrific murders committed by Dutch

and his gang.”(CLC volume 65 Author Overview) “Billy Bathgate is intended as pure myth, a sort of Robin Hood for grown-ups. Other novels may be more psychologically subtle or emotionally resonant. But few of those celebrate, as well as Billy Bathgate does, the raw, sometimes amoral

energy of life, so often feared by the timid and the primly virtuous…Billy Bathgate, with it’s driving rhythms and hair-trigger images, is as bracing as a shot of Dutch Schultz’s bootleg scotch.” (Bemrose p. 58-9) Having read the first chapter of the novel, any reader would know exactly what Mr. Bemrose is talking about. The novel kind of grabs you and dares you to put it down because it knows that you can’t. Bemrose continues by saying “Billy Bathgate is a celebration of life as well, particularly the life of youth, with it’s boundless resilience and illusions of immortality.” (Bemrose 58-9) “He (Doctorow) is interested not in the abstractions of corruption, but in the simple, emotional things of the criminal existence-what it feels like to be a gangster, what

moral and psychological universe one inhabit. It’s day to

day mechanics and, perhaps most importantly, how one survives a life of violence. Thus, underneath the soft prose of Billy’s voice, we are given glimpses of the

murderous danger of the criminal life, and how the people who live it, particularly it’s leaders, keep their heads above water.” (Clifford p.29)

Setting

Doctorow accomplishes the task of recreating the Bronx in the 1930’s with perfection. Everything from the attitude of the depression to the realness of the gang scene is more than vividly expressed throughout the novel. It’s almost like Doctorow paints the picture of the 1930’s in such an explicit manner that the reader can smell the tension of financial burden in the air. “Critics marveled at Doctorow’s vivid descriptions of New York City in The 1930’s…” (CLC vol. 65 Author Overview) “Doctorow’s novel makes full and loving use of the manners, the artifacts, the savors and the rhythms of the 30’s. He is marvelously skillful at getting into the thoughts and the

lingo of the time.” (Eder p.3) Doctorow doesn’t just bring

us the thirties, he brings us the thirties that nobody else will. In the depression era, there were many things that

were done for money because there was no alternative. Three of these things were theft, bootlegging, and gangs, all of which seemed to come hand in hand with another. Billy and his adolescent friends are common thieves until Dutch

Schultz takes Billy under his wing. Dutch Schultz himself

was on a bootleg run when he met Billy. As far as the gangs, well, the whole book is about gangs. “In composing Billy Bathgate out of a boy’s divided loyalties, E.L.

Doctorow has restored to The memory of American culture the era of the Great Depression it has tried to forget. In recovering the cultural legacy of the Depression era, Doctorow has produced a book that promises to remain as permanent an addition to it’s culture as The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, it’s cultural predecessor.”(Pease p.458-9)

Doctorow does a spectacular job in recrea

Внимание, отключите Adblock

Вы посетили наш сайт со включенным блокировщиком рекламы!
Ссылка для скачивания станет доступной сразу после отключения Adblock!

Скачать