Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ

The late Nobelist’s first novel—and the first of his I’ve read�Dangling Man is a novel in the form of a personal journal. Written (by Bellow) a year or so after the period of the journal (by Joseph), the winter-spring of 1942-43, it recounts a young Chicagoan’s wait before being inducted into the Army. A technicality has thrust him into a kind of limbo of waiting and he sourly muses his way through it, behaving like an ass to his wife and acquaintances. The time is meant as a kind of gift to him, a freedom to pursue his intellectual interests and enjoy the weeks or months before he must join the war. But the freedom is a burden and he slinks into a chip-on-his-shoulder depression instead. He resents his brother, his wife, his niece, his one-time friends, his rooming house neighbors. The book drags, even though it is only 142 pages long, with the reader wearying of Joseph’s ennui well before Joseph finally does and up and enlists. The author goes on to better things, Joseph, I suspect, does not.