![]() ![]() Set 60 years ago, the novel nonetheless has a number of parallels to our time. In one or two sentences at the end of a chapter, Whitehead can change the book’s whole trajectory. The novel gains force through accumulation and acceleration – brake and gas, gas and brake, until we are far from where we started. The three acts could make satisfying novellas on their own, but they’re better together. ![]() What’s our responsibility to the greater social good? The three parts present our options: descent, personal advancement, social progress. “The mistake was to believe he’d become someone else.” Act 3 considers whether a man should step up to help others. We could call this the illusion of advancement we all get suckered into it. Act 2 considers Carney’s upward criminal climb. Act 1 shows how easily a man can step downward into crime. The novel is structured in three instalments, covering a period from 1959 to 1964, each climactically peaking with criminal activity. ![]()
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