Miss Lonelyhearts
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| Miss Lonelyhearts | |
 1949 first UK edition cover |
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| Author | Nathanael West |
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| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Publisher | Liveright |
| Publication date | April 8, 1933 |
| Media type | Print, Hardcover, Paperback |
Miss Lonelyhearts, published in 1933, is Nathanael West's second novel. It is an Expressionist black comedy set in New York City during the Great Depression.
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[edit] Plot summary
In the story, Miss Lonelyhearts is an unnamed male newspaper columnist writing an advice column which is viewed by the newspaper as a joke. As "Miss Lonelyhearts" reads letters from desperate New Yorkers, he feels terribly burdened and falls into a cycle of deep depression, accompanied by heavy drinking and occasional barfights. He also suffers from the pranks and cynical advice of his editor at the newspaper, named "Shrike", which is also a type of predatory bird.
Miss Lonelyhearts tries several approaches as a way out of this depression (including religion, escaping to the countryside, and sex) but only ends up more confused. Miss Lonelyhearts has an affair with one of his readers but ends up striking her in an effort to fend off her advances. In the last scene, the woman's husband comes to kill the columnist, but he, in the grip of a kind of religious mania, fails to understand this. The man shoots Miss Lonelyhearts, and the two men roll down a flight of stairs together. It is implied, but not stated outright, that Miss Lonelyhearts is killed in this encounter.
[edit] Major themes
The general theme of the novel is one of extreme disillusionment with Depression-era American society, a consistent theme throughout West's novels. However, the novel is essentially a black comedy and is characterized by an extremely dark but clever sense of humor and irony.
The novel can be treated as a meditation on the theme of theodicy, or the problem of why evil exists in the world. The novel's protagonist is psychologically overwhelmed by his perception of this evil, which is treated as an explanation for his increasingly desperate psychological condition.
Although the characters of Miss Lonelyhearts are grotesque caricatures, the periodic letters sent to Miss Lonelyhearts, which describe real people with real insoluble problems, serve to ground the novel's Expressionism in reality.
Many of the problems described in Miss Lonelyhearts describe actual economic conditions in New York City during the Great Depression, although the novel carefully avoids questions of national politics. Moreover, the novel is particularly important due to its existential import. The characters seem to be living in an amoral world. Hence, they resort to heavy drinking, sex, and parties. Miss Lonelyhearts has a "Christ complex", which stands for his belief in religion as a solution to a world devoid of values. However, he approaches the status of an absurd hero insofar as his religious convictions further his depression and disillusionment. Ironically, he is shot at the moment he thinks he has had a religious conversion.
[edit] Film, TV or theatrical adaptations
[edit] 1933 film
In 1933, the novel was very loosely adapted as a movie, Advice to the Lovelorn, starring Lee Tracy, produced by 20th Century Pictures -- before its merger with Fox Film Corporation -- and released by United Artists. Greatly changed from the novel, it became a comedy/drama about a hard-boiled reporter who becomes popular when he adopts a female pseudonym and dispenses fatuous advice. He agrees (for a hefty payment) to use the column to recommend a line of medicines, but finds out they are actually harmful drugs when his mother dies. He then agrees to help the police track down the criminals. The movie ends with the main character happily married.
[edit] Broadway
In 1957, the novel was adapted into a stage play entitled Miss Lonelyhearts by Howard Teichmann. It opened on Broadway at the Music Box Theatre on October 3, 1957 in a production directed by Alan Schneider and designed by Jo Mielziner and Patricia Zipprodt. It ran for only twelve performances.
[edit] 1958 film
- Main article, see Lonelyhearts
In 1958 the plot was again filmed as Lonelyhearts, starring Montgomery Clift, Robert Ryan, and Myrna Loy, produced by Dore Schary and released by United Artists. Although following the plot of the book more closely than Advice to the Lovelorn, many changes were made. the movie greatly softens the cynical edge of the original book, and the story is once more given a happy ending -- the woman's husband is talked out of shooting Miss Lonelyhearts, who finds happiness with his true love, and Shrike is considerably nicer at film's end. It was filmed once more in 1983 as Miss Lonelyhearts, again undercutting the cynicism by making the author a figure of pathos.
[edit] 2006 Opera
In 2006, composer Lowell Liebermann completed Miss Lonelyhearts, An Opera in Two Acts, Op. 93. The libretto was written by J. D. McClatchy. The opera, which received its premiere April 26, 28, and 30, 2006 at the Juilliard Opera Center, was commissioned by the Juilliard School for its centennial celebration. The Opera was co-commissioned by two other schools USC's Thornton School of Music as well as the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music. In contrast to the film adaptations and Broadway production based on West's novel, Liebermann's opera successfully recreates the dark tone and biting ironic comedy of the original story in a masterful musical setting.
The opera was co-produced by the Thornton School of Music Opera Program at University of Southern California, and received its West Coast Premiere at the school on April 20-22, 2007. Both premieres were directed by renowned stage director and Thornton faculty member Ken Cazan. Liebermann and McClatchy cleaned up a few bits of the score for this performance, having seen what needed work the preceding year.
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