Experimental feature: Order The Enormous Room (Dover Thrift Editions) from the UK, Canada, Germany or France by clicking an appropriate flag below.

               

Some items available at Amazon.com are not available in all countries.

Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.52
EAN: 9780486421209
ISBN: 0486421201
Label: Dover Publications
Manufacturer: Dover Publications
Number Of Items: 1
Book Pages: 224
Publication Date: 2002-08-26
Publisher: Dover Publications
Studio: Dover Publications

Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Plotless Series of Character Sketches Make the Work a Bore
Review: This is not a book for everyone. I received this book as a gift from a relative, and that's the main reason I thought I'd try it. The book is a portrayal of E.E. Cummings' imprisonment in France during WWI, and the bulk of the work is a portrayal of the many characters Cummings saw at the prison -- and the many cruelties they suffered at the hands of their keepers and each other. While Cummings' prose is casual, ironic, and sometimes amusing, the work as a whole suffers from a lack of a plot to drive it forward. I frequently grew tired of reading one elaborate character sketch after another. Other people obviously are forgiving of this fault because they enjoy Cummings' prose so much, but I couldn't bear it.

---

Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Interior Decorating
Review: Best known for his poetry, "The Enormous Room" may seem like a departure for e.e. cummings. The artist turned his experience as a prisoner-of-war in France during WWI into a lyric memoir that reads like a novel. At times poetic, at others almost laughingly absurd in its depictions of the absurdities of imprisonment, "The Enormous Room" is a delectable read.

Cummings begins his novel by recounting his arrest and that of his friend, referred to only as B. They are eventually separated, and questioned, only to be reunited in jail. Apparently B. wrote some letters that the French censors considered to be seditious, and since Cummings was his constant companion and wouldn't denounce his friend, he was sent to jail as well. The remainder of the novel is filled with sketches of everyday life and the fellow inmates that Cummings befriends during his stay. For that reason, it reads like a series of vignettes rather than a cohesive novel.

While I enjoyed the book overall, I did not like the edition I had - an older printing of the Everyman's Library, which included no translations for entire conversations in French. Perhaps the most poignant aspect of "The Enormous Room" is the letter included at the start, written by Cummings' father as he tries to discover exactly what has happened to his son. Anyone familiar with the poems of e.e. cummings can see the poetry in his prose, in his descriptions and observations about life in jail, and the delight he takes in the rare moments of beauty that he could find.

---

Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Great, but not a classic.
Review: Never more relevant than today, eighty-some years removed from World War I (to end all wars, ironically), this book deals with issues that nations still have not seemed to solved: fascist governments, disregard for due process, injustice in the name of expediency and national security. That the US quarantines Japanese-Americans twenty years after its first run only embarasses us; that eighty years later we still do the same thing breaks your heart.

Mr. Cummings writes in a sort of stream-of-consciousness first person, something on the order of Romantic prose mixed with his own style that is inimitably his own. A student of Cummings might be quick to see the parallel between his earliest poems and that evolution to his modern free verse, as taking place within this novel right before one's eyes.

Enjoyable stories, and Mr. Cummings and his friend are something of snobs, something of braggards even (becoming fluent in French after two weeks is extremely hard to believe). The annoyance quickly passes (and crops up again whever he mentions how much more evolved he is than other Americans) when he paints such vivid mental images of life in the enormous room, the ennui and absurdity of being held without due process, and the veritable Ellis Island of characters populating his new world.

A reader would do well to approach this book without reading the hyperbole of its back cover or the well-meaning but misguided praqises of some reviewers. This is a great book, but not a classic. Cummings is not a master novelist, which does not dimish his effort or take anything from his creative genius. Rather, it is much like falling into the trap of thinking a master in one form can be a master in another. Enjoy the reading, and marvel at ironic relevance it holds for us today.

Fred

---

Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Much better than I expected it to be.
Review: E. E. Cummings, The Enormous Room (Liveright, 1921)

Cummings became famous for his poetry, but before that he wrote a now obscure novel-cum-memoir about his temporary imprisonment during World War I, The Enormous Room. Modeled loosely after Bunyan's magnum opus, Pilgrim's Progress, Cummings gives us the arrest and detention (for he is never sent to prison, only detained awaiting the word of the Commission on whether he is to be imprisoned or freed) of a friend of his and himself. The friend is charged with treason after writing letters home critical of the French government; Cummings is charged with nothing but being his friend.

The book touches all the expected bases; the horrors of war, problems with authority, etc., etc. Nothing here you haven't seen before. What causes it to stand out is Cummings' treatment of the whole thing. Cummings takes an horrific experience and makes it a whimsical way to pass the time, only allowing enough of the horror to show through so that the reader can understand the irony of Cummings' presentation here.

The book is well-written, though a bit jarring in places; it is written rather like you would hear the story from someone sitting next to you at the club smoking a cigar, although all too overeager at times. Cummings' enthusiasm for his subject, though, is a refreshing change from the usual war novel. This is not a book that is easy to digest, but is worth the effort. *** ½

---

Customer Rating:
Review Summary: An Enormous Achievement
Review: Written by America's most inventive poet, "The Enormous Room" is a book of prose set in a French detention camp during World War One. It is a coming-of-age story in which events happen, not always to the narrator (E.E. Cummings), but to the inhabitants of a place that serves as a microcosm for all the folly and brutality of war itself. As a war narrative it is unique -- unlike Hemingway's "Farewell to Arms" or Remarque's "All Quiet on the Western Front," the central story doesn't take place on the front lines. The plot of the book is basically non-linear, with the exception of the first three or four chapters, and several passages are written in French (thankfully a glossary of foreign terms is printed at the back of the book). I would describe Cummings' story as a stream-of-consciousness dialogue with himself, written in the language of a talented budding poet. Most memorable are the wonderful characters Cummings encountered during his short stay at La Ferte Mace, the name of the camp in which he was interned. They are objects of torn humanity and how terrible it must have been for him to leave them, knowing that upon his release many would languish in prison for the rest of their lives. "The Enormous Room" is a unique historical fiction. It is not an easy read, but it is one of those books that is even more difficult to put down. I have never read another book quite like it. [P.S.: There are two editions of the book, one published by Boni & Liveright and the other by Penquin Classics. The Liveright edition is the better one (and naturally harder to locate online or in book stores), and includes samples of drawings that Cummings made during his confinement.]

---

---