Wall to Wall

by Douglas Woolf

Like so many of Woolf's odysseys into the heart of America's subcultures, "Wall to Wall" traces a modern Ulysses in reverse: from a West Coast asylum where he works as an attendant to a Boston asylum where he visits his mother, Claude Squires views roadside America from its weak side--the tough underbelly of the Southwest, Tucson, the Rio Grande, Nogales, The Border--before thrusting himself into Okie's sacred shrine, Oklahoma City, and into the staid Eastern Corridor that ends in Boston. Claude's vehicle is a '59 Thunderhead, a "female beast," which his father, a used-car dealer in L.A., has commissioned him to deliver to Oklahoma City. And like all of Woolf's cars, the Thunderhead is a "she," a domineering companion in Claude's cross-country picaresque "flight of passage." In "Wall to Wall" Woolf's view is evocative and is very much his own. First published by Grove Press in 1962, "Wall to Wall" has been an underground classic for over thirty-five years, a comic and satiric masterpiece.

190 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1962

Reviews

[Shawn · Rating 4 out of 5]

So here's a fine little just-barely Beat-era novel (and that's "Beat" not "Beatnik") that I polished off - I like the occasional shift to straighter Lit to cleanse my genre palate and occasionally remind me of what writing about human beings, thinking human thoughts and living lives (as opposed to being locked into genre expectations of forward moving plots, likeable characters, and evoking whatever elements that particular genre calls for) reads and feels like. And, when it's good, it feels like being reminded of some larger scope, some brighter light, some higher sky...

To be avoided by those who require any of the above mentioned "expectations" or those who are unable to place writing in a particular time period, place of origin and generational view (and thus understanding that a mindset is being sketched, an attempt to capture particular thoughts and opinions during the quick change of the 20th Century).

Claude Squires, restless war veteran, quits his job as an orderly at a West Coast mental institution, visits his sister Claudine, visits his father (an up-and-coming local celebrity nicknamed "The Cat", the charismatic owner of an enormous used-car operation - an excellent sequence) and negotiates to drive a bright red '59 Thunderhead to its owner in Oklahoma, stopping along the way to visit an old flame (now desperately trapped in a go-nowhere life in Arizona - another great series of sequences, capturing the 50's and the feelings of Beat restlessness and aimlessness extremely well), to rescue a hitchhiking illegal immigrant and take him back into America, and to take a strange detour with a group of underground survivalists, part of the "Radiation Generation" who are into the presumed next art movement, Cavism. Then complete the delivery, push on to NYC in yet another delivered car, check out some scattered friends (sad and interesting) and finish up in Boston, visiting his mother... in a mental institution.

The writing is a great example of "Good Beat" - real life prosaic details interlaced with just the right amount of occasional poetic tint (in other words, no huge stretches of indulgent word salad) and scathing observation - telling the truth about the past, the present, and how the future looks from that moment, to this person...

The Beat fascination with cars, driving, travel and movement is here - but again, not indulged in, just explored during long stretches of the delivery (the car is "The Beast" to Claude), musing on man's relationship with this machine central to the imagination and economy of the U.S. The varied people Claude meets are all so well drawn they seem plucked from life:

Claude's Father, "The Cat", a raconteur salesman and symbol of the 1950s success story, leading a pride of young salesmen all of whom he loves like sons.

Pete, the traveling Mexican who may, secretly be a king (or is it just a story he tells himself to make life easier to live? - "Then I buy the land back and we will live in the future like in the past, only better").

Vivien - an old flame, trapped in a dead-end town, writing poetry ("I had no idea that poems could be written from life, by living people, here and now") and desperate to "get out of here" (and away from her pathetic, abusive, alcoholic, ex-military brother telling horrid torture stories over dinner) but likely never to.

The Cavists - a weird clan living in tunnels in the desert, assured by some abyssal messiah of a lost civilization that the future holds nothing but a radioactive wasteland on the surface (nice reflection of the 30s-40s pulp magazines influence on the Beat writers, while precursoring the 60s counter-culture)

Fran - another old flame, living a life similar to Vivian's but very happy and content in it - accommodating and frank about life and love.

There's lots of open road and seedy bars and restaurants here, of course, and some quietly funny and honest moments (fear of cops and border patrol, an angry attempt to leave a small town in a big car only to become trapped in a maze of suburban streets), recurrent images of coyotes, and that strange detour with the Cavists.

Really, quite a nice little sketch of the mental state of a certain strata of a generation at a particular point in time. If you only know the Beats through reputation, caricature (beatniks) or a negative reaction to some of their literary excesses, you might want to check out this smooth, liquid book. Just don't expect a "point" so much as a question...

[Sam Gilbert · Rating 2 out of 5]

Utter lack of interest in this writer.

[Sam · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've read this twice now. It's a quick read, and interesting. I can't say it held any revelations that changed my life for better or worse, but it was a fun book to read. I will probably pick it up again to see what I missed the first two times.