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Last Exit To Brooklyn Group Read

WHEN
Discussion Starts: 20 December, 2012

People can stop by this thread to chat in the meantime, and I might post some bonus material, but no spoilers until discussion opens please.

ABOUT THE BOOK:
290 pages, first published 1964.

Last Exit to Brooklyn is a 1964 novel by American author Hubert Selby, Jr. The novel has become a cult classic because of its harsh, uncompromising look at lower class Brooklyn in the 1950s and for its brusque, everyman style of prose.
Although critics and fellow writers praised the book on its release, Last Exit to Brooklyn caused much controversy due to its frank portrayals of taboo subjects, such as drug use, street violence, gang rape, homosexuality, transvestism and domestic violence. It was the subject of an important obscenity trial in the United Kingdom and was banned in Italy.

I thought this little piece of Hubert Selby Jr.'s wiki entry was interesting...

Life after Last Exit to Brooklyn
In 1971, Selby published his second novel, The Room. The novel received positive reviews. The Room was about a criminally insane man locked up in one room in a prison who reminisces about his disturbing past. Selby himself described The Room as "the most disturbing book ever written," and he noted that he could not read it for decades after writing it.

Selby continued to write short fiction, screenplays and teleplays at his apartment in West Hollywood... For the last 20 years of his life, Selby taught creative writing as an adjunct professor in the Master of Professional Writing program at the University of Southern California. Selby often wryly noted that The New York Times would not review his books when they were published, but he predicted that they would print his obituary.

A film adaptation of Last Exit to Brooklyn, directed by Uli Edel, was made in 1989, while Selby's 1978 novel Requiem for a Dream was made into a film released in 2000. Brooklyn featured Selby himself in a brief cameo as a taxi driver; in Dream he appeared in a small role as a prison guard. Ellen Burstyn was nominated for an Academy Award as Best Actress for her role in the latter film. During the filming of Last Exit, a documentary was shot, following Selby and some friends around the neighborhood as they reminisced.

In the 1980s, Selby made the acquaintance of punk rock singer Henry Rollins, who had long admired Selby's works and publicly championed them. Rollins not only helped broaden Selby's readership, but also arranged recording sessions and reading tours for Selby. Rollins issued original recordings through his own 2.13.61 publications, and distributed Selby's other works.

Selby suffered from depression which intensified towards the end of his life, but was always a caring father and grandfather. The last month of his life Selby spent in and out of the hospital. He died in Highland Park, Los Angeles, on April 26, 2004 of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. The New York Times printed his obituary the following day.

This piece from the back of the Kindle Edition is awesome:

"Selby's mother was a strict disciplinarian and a devout Christian who "sang in the same choir for more than sixty years". According to Selby, she responded deeply to the world depicted in Last Exit To Brooklyn, despite the novel's explicit language and violence. "She said, 'Oh, those poor people,'" Selby recalled. "I REALLY must have succeeded," he continued, "in doing what I planned to do. And that is: Put the reader through an emotional experience, because the experience of reading that book transcended all her prejudices, her ideas, her beliefs, and she just responded to the pain of the people."

I'm midway through this and loving it -- definitely an intense, powerful read. Looking forward to the group discussion!

I'm reading the Kindle edition with the Selby biography at the end too, Ruby, though I haven't finished the actual novel and gotten to that bit yet.

I fully intend to buy a hardcopy of this. I found the Kindle Edition really made the structure seem very muddled. Also, I suspect the original format and typesetting were quite important to the novel.

**DISCUSSION IS NOW OPEN!** Okay, so I have some burning questions about this one. I'm staring the thread now!

For my part, there are two questions that have stayed with me since I finished the book:

1) Every gay, bisexual or transgendered character in this book is portrayed in an extremely negative light (one character even sexually assaults a child). Do you think this is intentional? For what purpose? Was he simply showing a snapshot of a really ugly way of life, or did he actually view all LGBT people in this light? [Yes, I could've looked it up, but I'm trying to finish off the other extravaganza books!]

2) There is only one character I can think of who isn't a terrible person in some respect - the sainted widow, Ada. What's that all about then? I noticed the author's mother's name was Adalin, BTW, so maybe that has something to do with it..

Wow... there is alot to say about this book, but at the same time I'm not quite sure what to say. Very raw and uncut novel, but hard to put down even in the midst of some really horrible events.

I read somewhere (not sure how true) that Selby used the forwardslash instead of an apostrophe, because it was easier to reach on his typewriter and then he wouldn't have to slow down the stream of conciousness narrative as he was typing. I did notice often times he would just ignore both though.

I really liked the stream of conciousness approach in "The Queen is Dead". I felt pulled into the story and the various substances. Also the ambiguity of who was talking at any time or who was male/female, worked to further pull the reader into this drug fueled deviant world. Everything is happening all around you, but you just catch bits and pieces, here and there.

Last Exit reminded me of William S. Burroughs but more down to earth. Also you can see Selby's influence into the music of Lou Reed (or at least they were in similar circles).

Total tally of repeated words throughout the text:
"Beer" appears 129 times while "Drink" or its various forms (drinks, drinking, etc.) appeared 170 times.
"Cigarette" appears 77 times, while "Smoke" (and various forms) appeared 58 times.
References to Benzedrine appear 77 times, (Benzedrine, Bennie).

Ruby wrote: "**DISCUSSION IS NOW OPEN!** Okay, so I have some burning questions about this one. I'm staring the thread now!

For my part, there are two questions that have stayed with me since I finished the bo..."

To respond to Ruby's questions:

1) I didn't get the feeling that Selby was making LGBT people specifically appear as horrible people, in so much that he made almost everybody in the novel appear quite bad. I don't think they were purposefully made to be worse.

2) I would agree that she probably was at least somewhat based on his mother in hindsight with her devout religousness. If I recall correctly she talks about her son dying in the war, overseas. I think Selby was maybe trying to write for himself how his own mother would have felt if he had died (which he almost did) while overseas in the Merchant Marines.

From Time magazines archives, here is a review of Last Exit written when the book first came out. I found it interesting because I doubt that the reaction would be the same were it published today.

'There are critics (Grove is already assembling them) who will defend as art and high realism a book that describes such life and death with the primitive but undeniable power and anger that Author Selby demonstrates. But Last Exit to Brooklyn is not realism at all. Instead, it is a hypocrisy just as flagrant as the old-fashioned kind that wrote for dirty words and **** for scenes of sex. What Selby scrupulously elides are all the pleasant moments of life. What's left, he tells in a style that will also inevitably be hailed as "tape-recorder realism"-because it mumbles like the nonstop mouthings of a drink-sodden bum or screams like a borderline psychotic'. I don't pay much attention to professional reviewers but I think these reviews sometimes give us an idea of the times.

Ruby wrote: "I thought this little piece of Hubert Selby Jr.'s wiki entry was interesting...

Life after Last Exit to Brooklyn
In 1971, Selby published his second novel, The Room. The novel received positive re..." Per The Room, this is the only book I read that made me sick to my stomach, literally. The thoughts of the only character, jailed in a room are both revolting and disturbing. Terrible crimes are described, sometimes real, sometimes imagined and always in the cold unrepentant voice of a sociopath. I bring this up because it has always been hard for me to imagine Selby as the product of a loving home. The voice in The Room is so true to its nature that I wonder how Selby managed it it.

Ben wrote: "I read somewhere (not sure how true) that Selby used the forwardslash instead of an apostrophe, because it was easier to reach on his typewriter and then he wouldn't have to slow down the stream of conciousness narrative as he was typing. I did notice often times he would just ignore both though.
..."

That sounds quite likely to me. This is also why I'd like to get the hardcopy. I don't trust the formatting on the Kindle edition to be true to the original. I'm pretty sure not ALL the typos/errors/omissions were his. Also, the structure was very hard to wrap my head around on the Kindle. I need to see it in book format to really grasp it, I think. When people refer to the individual stories, I don't even register them that way because Kindle formatting is so ambiguous to me.

Ben - I agree that everyone was portrayed in an ugly light, but I thought making the child molester someone who was gay, if confused and somewhat closeted, was a bit suspect. I'm not saying that Selby had any kind of social responsibility in this, (art is just art after all), but I wonder if he really felt that LGBT people were more likely to be paedophiles?

I wonder what Selby was trying to do with the character of Ada, even assuming it was a portrait of his mother under different circumstances. Was she just there for contrast? It just seems odd that there is a lone saint in this Sodom & Gomorrah. As the review Karen posted above says, Selby does seem to have removed everything else in that place that is "pleasant". Was she there to show that in that place even the pure-hearted can only experience sorrow?
(Pardon the christian imagery, BTW. Where did that come from..?)

Oddly, I found I was most disgusted by the group of housewives sitting on the bench, farting, gossiping and picking each others' nits. And that was before they started barracking for the baby's death. Those scenes were the only ones that didn't ring true to me. I've seen some shit in my lifetime, but I've never seen people actually behave like that. Not anywhere.

Karen - You're really making me want to read The Room now...

Ruby wrote: "Oddly, I found I was most disgusted by the group of housewives sitting on the bench, farting, gossiping and picking each others' nits. And that was before they started barracking for the baby's death. Those scenes were the only ones that didn't ring true to me. I've seen some shit in my lifetime, but I've never seen people actually behave like that. Not anywhere."

I don't know if those scenes exactly "rang true" for me either, but I didn't have a problem with them. I think all of the characters in the novel are portrayed in the worst light possible and the different perspectives also skew things. There's a lot of exaggeration, maybe in every story. The one that definitely jumps out at me is Abraham in the last section, when he is picking up Lucy in the bar. He thinks he's so smooth, and is describing the event happening exactly as he bragged about to his friends earlier -- come on, no one is that smooth. He "complains" about having to have sex like 5 times because she is insatiable. I don't buy it as a real event, but I buy it in the context of the novel because it's from his perspective, in his voice.

Slightly different with the gossiping women. To me, it seemed like their sections were from an outsider's POV, who may have exaggerated their actions to put them in even a worse light. It may even be metaphorical ("nitpicking" everyone?)

Anyway, maybe it's because of my experiences living in Brooklyn for twentysomething years, but I thought the images here were so strong. I could totally see those old gossipy biddies sitting on a bench on Ocean Parkway -- they'd be right at home even today, especially if they were speaking Russian or Polish.


Ruby wrote: "I don't trust the formatting on the Kindle edition to be true to the original. I'm pretty sure not ALL the typos/errors/omissions were his."

I was a little unsure about this as well -- it took me a few pages to be satisfied that it was a deliberate writing choice and not just wonky kindle formatting (cause I've gotten some Kindle books like that!) There were some things I thought were actual typos/formatting errors though, but on the whole I think the formatting (long run-ons, whole pages of capslock, using the slash instead of an apostrophe) and dialect really added a lot to the experience of reading.

Ruby wrote: "1) Every gay, bisexual or transgendered character in this book is portrayed in an extremely negative light (one character even sexually assaults a child). Do you think this is intentional? For what purpose? Was he simply showing a snapshot of a really ugly way of life, or did he actually view all LGBT people in this light?"

I agree with Ben -- I think pretty much all the characters were portrayed in a very negative light. I don't think there was any anti-homosexual agenda in the book (at least I hope not, cause I really loved it). Actually I think some of the most sympathetic characters were the GLBT ones -- I found "The Queen Is Dead" (Georgette's section) absolutely heartbreaking. I think Georgette was a really powerful (even positive?) character and her homophobic brother was portrayed as much worse. That may be my bias though, and since that was early in the book my recollections may be a little colored by my personal experience.

Even Harry, who obviously does a despicable thing by molesting a child, is kind of sympathetic to me. He's so obnoxious in that whole story but he's just so pathetic at the same time. I can't help feel bad for him on some level.

Riona wrote: "Ruby wrote: "I think pretty much all the characters were portrayed in a very negative light. I don't think there was any anti-homosexual agenda in the book (at least I hope not, cause I really loved it). Actually I think some of the most sympathetic characters were the GLBT ones -- I found "The Queen Is Dead" (Georgette's section) absolutely heartbreaking. I think Georgette was a really powerful (even positive?) character and her homophobic brother was portrayed as much worse. That may be my bias though, and since that was early in the book my recollections may be a little colored by my personal experience...."

Fair enough. I loved that story too, and Georgette was sympathetic - although possibly not positive. Her desperation and obsession were quite tragic I thought. It's a good point about the brother - I hadn't thought of it that way, but he DOES come off very badly.

Maybe positive was a bit too strong of a word to use. Though she is a rather tragic character (among many others), I also found her kind of inspirational in a way. Though she's not always completely confident throughout the story, she's one of the characters that seems most comfortable with who she is even as the boys are calling her a freak and threatening her. I have a lot of drag queen friends and I know self-confidence is pretty much a must when you go out in face in public, but considering that this book was written before Stonewall and the whole gay rights movement, I thought Georgette was portrayed in a pretty positive light. At that time period, I actually would have expected her written more as a "Hey look at this freaky man in a dress" kind of way, so I was pleasantly surprised that Selby took a more human, sympathetic, and complicated approach.

This is true. I've found that drag queens have been the most courageous people I've known (they've had to be), even while at the same time also often nursing some pretty deep-seated fears. Selby does capture that complexity of character very, very well.

At the end of the day, I guess the kind of people who equate gay men and pedophiles aren't in reality going to be reading this and saying, "I told you so" anyway!

Bahaha! Just started looking through my Kindle notes and found a great example of something I thought was probably a Kindle error:
"The following is a fist of evictions from the Project.."

One of the reasons I think the women on the bench felt a bit...off.. to me, is that it kind of reminds me of the trashy current affairs shows on tv that do regular beat-up stories on "dole bludgers", characterising people on unemployment payments as being irresponsible parasites. That part of the book had a hint of that flavour I thought.

I'm surprised we haven't really talked much about Tralala yet. I found that story really compelling. All the more so, because it's the sort of thing that you know really happens, back then as today. I thought of the girls I've known who've led lives like that, and it was devastating. It was also a bit of a theme through the book - sex and violence going hand in hand.

Ruby wrote: "This is true. I've found that drag queens have been the most courageous people I've known (they've had to be), even while at the same time also often nursing some pretty deep-seated fears. Selby do..."So, have you read City of Night? I think this was written in the early 60's. The book describes the sub culture of drag queens, male hustlers and the gay population moving acorss the country. I think I read that it was the inspiration for Gus Van Sants movie 'My Private Idaho'. These characters are so real and somehow, so compelling within their own environment that I was completely taken with their stories. Good Book.

Ruby wrote: "Bahaha! Just started looking through my Kindle notes and found a great example of something I thought was probably a Kindle error:
"The following is a fist of evictions from the Project.."

One of ..." If I had to pick one theme for this book it would be that sex and violence Do go hand in hand. In nice, quiet nighborhoods the attraction is muted behind various social conventions. In Selby's neighborhoods both were sought often as not,like we would look for a good book.

Ruby wrote: "One of the reasons I think the women on the bench felt a bit...off.. to me, is that it kind of reminds me of the trashy current affairs shows on tv that do regular beat-up stories on "dole bludgers", characterising people on unemployment payments as being irresponsible parasites. That part of the book had a hint of that flavour I thought."

I'm not familiar with the term "dole bludgers", but I think I know the type of people you mean, and I think there were quite a few characters in the book that fit with that mindset. Everyone in the book is quite poor, but they tend to spend money irresponsibly -- Abraham spends all his money on looking good and trying to pick up chicks, Harry spends all his money on beer (well, not exactly "his" money, but you know).


I'm also surprised we haven't talked about Tralala yet! That gang-rape scene is kind of the elephant in the room...

Karen wrote: "So, have you read City of Night? I think this was written in the early 60's. The book describes the sub culture of drag queens, male hustlers and the gay population moving acorss the country. I think I read that it was the inspiration for Gus Van Sants movie 'My Private Idaho'. These characters are so real and somehow, so compelling within their own environment that I was completely taken with their stories. Good Book."

This sounds fascinating. TBR-ed!

Riona wrote: "I'm also surprised we haven't talked about Tralala yet! That gang-rape scene is kind of the elephant in the room...
.."

Yeah. But then, I really don't know what to say about it either! She was a very, very broken girl - but what was the excuse for those men?

Karen wrote: "Ruby wrote: "This is true. I've found that drag queens have been the most courageous people I've known (they've had to be), even while at the same time also often nursing some pretty deep-seated fe..."

I haven't, but will TBR. It's a bit raw for me this week, having just lost a friend of mine suddenly a few days ago (who used to do drag - and who I first met in drag). All I know was he had a very hard, lonely life. Kind of shy and sensitive usually, but very, strong and extroverted in drag. It was a bit of a shield for him I think.

Sorry to hear of your loss.

Thanks Karen. He had cardiomyopathy, so I think he kind of expected to die young. Very sad.

So getting back to the book..... Any other views on Tralala?

What a great discussion! I haven't finished the book yet, but can't stop jumping in on a couple points.

Regarding portrayal of characters as positive or negative, I think that's almost beside the point for this book. Selby is letting us get inside the heads of people in a particular time and place, and I find nothing but compassion is his portrayals of people that would be considered reprehensible by 'mainstream' society. Tralala doesn't even register that a letter contains words from someone who truly cares for her, because the only thing she see of value in herself is her tits and because the only thing she accepts as any form of 'affection' is money in exchange for sex. It was already heartbreaking even before the gang rape.

I'm also surprised that anyone thought Georgette's portrayal was negative. She has the soul of a poet. She's transported by the music of Charlie Parker, compares their lives to the writing of Genet, and reads Poe with so much feeling that even the 'rough trade' are touched. Selby says in the afterword that the real Georgie was largely his inspiration. I'll put the full quote in another post for people who may not have the edition with the afterward. As an aside, I thought the seen where Georgette only gets upset about getting a knife in her leg because it ruined her high was hilarious (as well as pathetic).

I don't think making Harry a child molester shows any kind of anti-gay bias. It's key that Harry is a closeted gay man. The statistics I've seen (and I fully recognize that I am no expert) suggest that openly gay men are much less likely to molest a child than ostensibly straight men, and that closeted homosexuals masquerading as straight men may be the most likely to molest children. Sexual repression creates pathology. Of course, these statistics wouldn't have been available to Selby at the time, he was going on observation.

Here's the quote from Selby about Georgie (Georgette):

"Actually Georgies death was responsible for my writing Last Exit. I had written the first part of ‘The Queen Is Dead,�� the part up to where he gets stabbed in the leg and they take him home. It was called ‘Loves Labors Lost.�� About a year and a half later I found out that Georgie had been found dead in the street, the gutter, of an OD, and it moved me very much. He was probably still in his teens when he died, or not much older. Somehow it just didnt seem right for a life, any life, to be dismissed like that, so I felt I had to honor his life by completing his story, he deserved no less than that. Certainly not romanticize or sentimentalize it, but to allow him to live it as he lived it. With the completion of his story the book started to take shape.
I always liked Georgie, and in retrospect (which is the only way I know anything), I can see why. I always felt alienated, apart from, separated, on the outside looking in, never belonging and trying desperately to be a part of something. Obviously Georgie felt the same way. A teenage, screaming, hysterical, drag queen, living near the waterfront in Brooklyn, padded T-shirts and glitter on his eyes, in the late 40s and early 50s. This is alienation. Today I see that I identified with his sense of alienation and so, in a way, writting his story I was writing my story."

Thank you so much for posting that, Whitney. Another great reason not to buy the Kindle edition!

I didn't think Georgie was portrayed particularly negatively, except in the sense of her utter desperation. As you say, there were times where she was shown as being quite "pathetic" in that desperation. That scene with the knife in her leg actually broke my heart. I found it really sad that she was still fawning over the man who did that to her. I had much the same reaction to Tralala (and you put that very well), she had so very little self respect, or self-worth, that she only saw the value of her body. And she had the same lack of respect for others as people too - only seeing them as providers of things she could use, like money or booze.

What I was keen to know was what Selby had in mind, and how he felt about the characters, so that Afterword is perfect. Thanks again for posting it.

Okay, finally finished! I see what was meant about the bench-sitters not ringing true. The depictions were overly broad with the descriptions of things like the nose-picking, and the one woman literally grooming the other like an ape. I interpreted them as a dark representation of society in general, those who sit in judgement of people around them without any attempt to sympathize or understand. I think most of us are also implicated to some extent, I'm sure Selby was well aware what attitude most readers would have towards the type of characters he's portraying. Hoping for the baby to fall seemed like another intentional exaggeration, in this case the enjoyment people take in the misfortune of others.

As has been mentioned, Georgette's brother was another character that was presented with little excuse. Selby's vitriol seems primarily reserved for people who condemn what they don't understand. The afterword in the book has Kenneth Allsop's comment about Selby's "compassion for the subterraneans and rage at the averted eye", which to me sums it up nicely.

I didn't think the 'coda' at the end was as strong as the rest of the book. There were great little slices of life in the projects, but they lacked the insight and empathy of the longer chapters.

Throughout the book, I thought Selby's shifting writing style was incredibly effective at capturing the tone of the different people he was portraying. Extra points for the all-caps yelling of Mary and Vinnie being just as teeth-grindingly annoying as it would have been in real life.

I really need to find an edition with that Afterword!
Your interpretation of the bench-sitters makes a lot of sense to me in that context. I think you really miss that "shifting writing style" and the delineation between the longer chapters and the coda in the Kindle edition, because it's all such a mishmash.

Yeah - the Mary and Vinnie YELLING bits were pretty vivid! I think my neighbours here must be related!

Ruby wrote: "**DISCUSSION IS NOW OPEN!** Okay, so I have some burning questions about this one. I'm staring the thread now!

For my part, there are two questions that have stayed with me since I finished the bo..."

I can't handle books/films that have no heroes. When all the characters are detestable, I just give up.I don't mind morally ambivalent but totally depraved doesn't do it for me whatever the author is trying to accomplish.

D.A. wrote: "I can't handle books/films that have no heroes. When all the characters are detestable, I just give up.I don't mind morally ambivalent but totally depraved doesn't do it for me whatever the author is trying to accomplish. .."

Are you saying you thought all the characters in this were detestable & depraved?

RE - I can't handle books/films that have no heroes.
That sounds incredibly limiting to me. No metaphor? Nothing unless it's black hats vs white hats?

I've not read the book - just popped in because I've finally decided that I _will_ read it.

I think Whitney hit the nail on the head with the "group of housewives sitting on the bench, farting, gossiping and picking each others' nits." When I first saw that comment, I was immediately reminded of films showing chimps doing that. I don't even know if it's really normal behaviour for chimps - maybe it's only a neurosis they develop in zoos - but Selby would have seen the same things, and I suspect that was exactly the image he was projecting.

"I can't handle books/films that have no heroes."

I sort of see where you're coming from. I don't think books have to have "heroes" as such, but I really have a hard time without any sympathetic characters - I'm already regretting my decision to read this book!

Derek wrote: "I've not read the book - just popped in because I've finally decided that I _will_ read it.

I think Whitney hit the nail on the head with the "group of housewives sitting on the bench, farting, g..."

I'm sorry if I gave the impression that the characters weren't sympathetic. Looking over my original post, I think I worded that poorly. As others have pointed out, you certainly do feel for the characters (at least most of them) at some point or other. The point I was trying to tease out was how Selby felt about LGBT people in real life. I wondered what his perspective really was.

You'll see what I mean, I'm sure.

Derek wrote: "I sort of see where you're coming from. I don't think books have to have "heroes" as such, but I really have a hard time without any sympathetic characters - I'm already regretting my decision to read this book!..."

It's been said indirectly above, but the characters ARE sympathetic, which is the strength (and largely the point) of Last Exit. Selby's characters are ones that few people would have any sympathy for if encountered in life, but Selby portrays them and their limited environment in such a way that you do sympathize with them. Not in a 'this is a person I'd like to hang out with' way, but in a 'pity for the limited horizons and circumscribed lives of these people' way.

I think there are definitely sympathetic characters in Last Exit. They're all flawed, but very real and easy to identify with (though some more than others, of course).