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Book Review
Apr. 2nd, 2006 05:12 pmThe Bridge of San Luis Rey
by Thornton Wilder
This book was astoundingly good. The story opens with the collapse of a bridge in Peru and then goes on to tell about the lives of the five people who perish because they happened to be on the bridge at the moment of collapse. The novel is very short, yet Wilder gives an amazingly complete sense of each of the five people, and he does it in elegant prose to boot. At a deeper level, The Bridge of San Luis Rey is an exploration of meaning in lives and events: where it lies, how it's created. The conclusion Wilder makes is rather uplifting without being smarmy or sentimental: meaning is found in human bonds, not in an accounting of deeds bad and good.
by Thornton Wilder
This book was astoundingly good. The story opens with the collapse of a bridge in Peru and then goes on to tell about the lives of the five people who perish because they happened to be on the bridge at the moment of collapse. The novel is very short, yet Wilder gives an amazingly complete sense of each of the five people, and he does it in elegant prose to boot. At a deeper level, The Bridge of San Luis Rey is an exploration of meaning in lives and events: where it lies, how it's created. The conclusion Wilder makes is rather uplifting without being smarmy or sentimental: meaning is found in human bonds, not in an accounting of deeds bad and good.
