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The Waterworks (1994)

de E. L. Doctorow, E.L. Doctorow

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1,3952513,207 (3.53)38
One rainy morning in 1871 young Martin Pemberton, walking down Broadway in lower Manhattan, sees in a passing horse-drawn omnibus several old men in black, one of whom he recognizes as his supposedly dead and buried father. So begins E.L. Doctorow's astounding new novel of post-Civil War New York, where maimed veterans beg in the streets, newsboys fight for their corners, the Tweed Ring operates the city for its own profit, and a conspicuously self-satisfied class of new wealth and weak intellect is all a glitter in a setting of mass misery. As Pemberton tries in vain to track the strange omnibus of old men, he leads us into a city we know and recognize and yet don't know, a ghost city that stands to contemporary New York like a panoramic negative print, reversed in its lights and shadows, its seasons turned round. The increasingly ominous tale is narrated by Pemberton's sometime employer, McIlvaine, the editor of the newspaper for which the young man writes occasional reviews. When Pemberton himself disappears, McIlvaine goes in pursuit of the truth of his freelance's bizarre fate. Layer by layer, he reveals to us a New York more deadly, more creative, more of a genius society than it is now. New technologies transport water to its reservoirs and gaslight to its streetlamps. Locomotives thunder down its streets. Telegraphy sings in its overhead wires, and its high-speed printing presses turn out tens of thousands of newspapers for a penny or two. It is a proudly, heedlessly modern city, and yet ... the scene of ancient, primordial urges and transgressions, a companion city of our dreams ... a moral hologram generated from this celebrated author's electrifying historical imagination. The Waterworks is a haunting tale of genius and madness in a metropolis that is itself a product of these qualities. Masterfully written and promising to be unforgettable, it is a triumphant addition to E.L. Doctorow's remarkable body of work.… (més)
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» Mira també 38 mencions

Es mostren 1-5 de 25 (següent | mostra-les totes)
I've very much enjoyed the two other novels of historical fiction by Doctorow that I've read ([The March] and [Ragtime]), but this one was a disappointment. It was very slow to start, and the affected writing style, including.... way too many... ellipses was ... distracting. The plot is interesting, and the portrait of New York City in the post-Civil War period was vivid, but I mostly felt bored every time I picked it up. ( )
  katiekrug | Dec 15, 2023 |
Great evocation of NY during the Tweed era, coupled with an odd fantasy of scientific callousness, longing for eternal life, cruelty, and an old man's reminiscences. ( )
  ffortsa | Dec 11, 2023 |
A stylized period piece that reads like a blend of the classic mysteries from the late 19th century and Edgar Allen Poe’s tales of the macabre. ( )
  wandaly | May 27, 2021 |
It's easy enough to read, but I had a little difficulty at first in developing an interest. But it came soon enough.

The narrator, McIlvaine, is a newspaperman. An editor at the start of the story, he works with my "freelances", as he call s them. The story takes place in the 1870s, although the narrator is recalling it from many years later.

One of the freelances is Martin Pemberton. Martin was disowned by his father, struck out of his will, for stating his belief that his father was a greedy SOB, although not in those exact words. Martin didn't care about money in any case and was happy to be on call for newspaper work. He became, in fact, the narrator's favorite, as he wrote well and reliably.

Then came the time Martin disappeared. McIlvaine made inquiries and learned that Martin had been telling others that he had seen his father - his dead father - in a carriage being driven down the street. He was among other old men. Although he'd not been close to his father, Martin was shaken by the image and compelled to figure out what he had seen and why.

And so, eventually, was McIlvaine. The answer is then the subject of the story. Quite a strange one it is, one dipping into medical sci fi and featuring a brilliant but amoral doctor.

I found it absorbing and odd enough to make me think a bit. ( )
  slojudy | Sep 8, 2020 |
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Nom de l'autorCàrrecTipus d'autorObra?Estat
E. L. Doctorowautor primaritotes les edicionscalculat
Doctorow, E.L.autor principaltotes les edicionsconfirmat
Hanzlíková, LudmilaTraductorautor secundarialgunes edicionsconfirmat

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People wouldn't take what Martin Pemberton said as literal truth, he was much too melodramatic or too tormented to speak plainly.
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Wikipedia en anglès (1)

One rainy morning in 1871 young Martin Pemberton, walking down Broadway in lower Manhattan, sees in a passing horse-drawn omnibus several old men in black, one of whom he recognizes as his supposedly dead and buried father. So begins E.L. Doctorow's astounding new novel of post-Civil War New York, where maimed veterans beg in the streets, newsboys fight for their corners, the Tweed Ring operates the city for its own profit, and a conspicuously self-satisfied class of new wealth and weak intellect is all a glitter in a setting of mass misery. As Pemberton tries in vain to track the strange omnibus of old men, he leads us into a city we know and recognize and yet don't know, a ghost city that stands to contemporary New York like a panoramic negative print, reversed in its lights and shadows, its seasons turned round. The increasingly ominous tale is narrated by Pemberton's sometime employer, McIlvaine, the editor of the newspaper for which the young man writes occasional reviews. When Pemberton himself disappears, McIlvaine goes in pursuit of the truth of his freelance's bizarre fate. Layer by layer, he reveals to us a New York more deadly, more creative, more of a genius society than it is now. New technologies transport water to its reservoirs and gaslight to its streetlamps. Locomotives thunder down its streets. Telegraphy sings in its overhead wires, and its high-speed printing presses turn out tens of thousands of newspapers for a penny or two. It is a proudly, heedlessly modern city, and yet ... the scene of ancient, primordial urges and transgressions, a companion city of our dreams ... a moral hologram generated from this celebrated author's electrifying historical imagination. The Waterworks is a haunting tale of genius and madness in a metropolis that is itself a product of these qualities. Masterfully written and promising to be unforgettable, it is a triumphant addition to E.L. Doctorow's remarkable body of work.

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