In Watermelon Sugar
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| Front cover of In Watermelon Sugar. | |
| Author | Richard Brautigan |
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| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Fiction |
| Publisher | Four Seasons Foundation (1968) |
| Released | 1968 |
| Media Type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| Pages | 138 pages |
| ISBN | ISBN 1-131-52372-5 |
| Preceded by | Trout Fishing in America (1967) |
| Followed by | The Revenge of the Lawn (1970) |
In Watermelon Sugar is a novel by Richard Brautigan published in 1968. It is a surreal tale of a village named "iDEATH", where everything is made of watermelon sugar. The narrator remains un-named throughout the book, and through his first person account we hear the story of the people and the events of iDEATH. The central tension is created by Margaret, once a lover of the narrator, and inBOIL, a man who has left iDEATH to live near the Forgotten Works and comes back with his gang of men to show the residents what iDEATH is. inBOIL and his gang bring about the violent climax of the novel.
The landscape of the novel is always changing. Each day has a different colored sun which creates different colored watermelons. Some critics believe the book to be about a new Eden in a post-apocalyptic world: the old destroyed world is represented by the Forgotten Works. The narrator becomes the new Adam in a new paradise. Some believe the novel to be about communal experiments in the 1960s. Some believe the novel to be about the intersection of nature and technology — a 20th century look at the pastoral.
One way to look at this book is to observe that all "negative" characters like Margaret and inBOIL are emotional, even passionate, while the proper citizens of iDEATH are emotionally shallow. While the former end in suicide the latter end in repeating very basic shallow phrases almost at the end of each small chapter. One may doubt that the writer intended to illustrate a possible clash between promiscuous, liberated lifestye of hippies and the old world Mediterranean, emotional overreactions, but this theme is certainly present in the book.
However, it is possible that this book is not about anything in particular, and that its sole purpose is entertainment.
In Watermelon Sugar is referenced in Dean Koontz's One Door Away from Heaven and Wally Lamb's I Know This Much Is True.
[edit] External links
- Barber, John F. (21 July 2006). "Novels > In Watermelon Sugar". Brautigan Bibliography and Archive. Retrieved on 2006-08-14.
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