The Bridge of San Luis Rey: A Novel
by Thornton Wilder
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Book Summary Information
Author: Thornton WilderEdition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2004-01-06
ISBN: 0060580615
Number of pages: 160
Publisher: Harper
Book Reviews of The Bridge of San Luis Rey: A Novel
Book Review: Such Gentle Wisdom
Summary: 5 Stars
A classic novella, written with exemplary simplicity and grace. An Inca footbridge suspended over a canyon in Peru collapses in 1714, killing five people who were crossing at the time: an elderly Marquesa, her sweetly unassuming orphan maid, a young man of many skills mourning the recent death of his twin brother, an aging Svengali with his fingers in every pie, and the illegitimate son of the Viceroy. A contemporary monk investigates their lives in an attempt to discern the hand of God in the event, whether as a punishment for wrongdoing or an early welcome into heaven. Following in his footsteps, Wilder emphasizes rather the interconnectedness of their lives and their effect on those they leave behind: the Marquesa's daughter (recipient of her beautiful letters), the famous actress Perichole, the Viceroy, a swashbuckling sea captain, and the self-sacrificing Abbess of the convent in Lima. His conclusion: "There is a land of the living and a land of the dead, and the bridge is love, the only survival, the only meaning."
Wilder won the Pulitzer Prize for this brief novel in 1928; it is still worth reading today, for its gentle wisdom, which is timeless, and for its style, which combines classic balance with Midwestern common sense. Here he is at his more formal, describing the Marquesa's letters: "The Conde delighted in her letters, but he thought that when he had enjoyed the style he had extracted all their richness and intention, missing (as most readers do) the whole purport of literature, which is the notation of the heart. Style is but the faintly contemptible vessel in which the bitter liquid is recommended to the world." And here he is speaking the thoughts of the youngest of the five people killed in the accident, the Viceroy's little boy: "Uncle Pio had just overtaken a friend of his, a sea-captain. And just as they got to the bridge he spoke to an old lady who was traveling with a little girl. Uncle Pio said that when they had crossed the bridge they would sit down and rest, but it turned out not to be necessary."
Although most of the novel is imaginary, the Perichole and the Viceroy are real people, given their real names. But in fact they lived a half-century later than when Wilder places them. And their son survived, to become one of the signers of the Peruvian Declaration of Independence in 1821.
Summary of The Bridge of San Luis Rey: A Novel
"On Friday noon, July the twentieth, 1714, the finest bridge in all Peru broke and precipitated five travelers into the gulf below." With this celebrated sentence, Thornton Wilder begins The Bridge of San Luis Rey, one of the towering achievements in American fiction and a novel read throughout the world.
By chance, a monk witnesses the tragedy. Brother Juniper seeks to prove that it was divine intervention rather than chance that led to the deaths of those who perished in the tragedy. His study leads to his own death -- and to the author's timeless investigation into the nature of love and the meaning of the human condition.
The Bridge of San Luis Rey is now reissued in this handsome hardcover edition featuring a new foreword by Russell Banks. Tappan Wilder has written an engaging and thought-provoking afterword, which includes unpublished notes for the Pulitzer Prize?winning novel, illuminating photographs, and other remarkable documentary material. Granville Hicks's insightful comment about Wilder suggests an inveterate truth: "As a craftsman he is second to none, and there are few who have looked deeper into the human heart."
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