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Joe Hill by Stegner Wallace (1990-09-01) Paperback
Vintage movie tie-in paperback
Paperback
First published January 1, 1971
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July 26, 2012
This book was a rare find. It is an English novelization of a Swedish film about a Swedish-american radical union organizer. And as much as I was excited to find it, I have mixed feeling after reading it.
This book is orange juice: Pure Pulp. On the back page, it's main advertisements by the publisher is for men's sports adventure books. As such, it's focus is not in the character study of Joe Hill the man, but the sort of thing you'd find in the 50s/60s pulp magazines; harrowing tales of violence and sex. And while I do enjoy that kind of thing, shoehorning it into the story of Joe Hill's life really doesn't produce the desired effect.
In essence, the book has two main purposes. One is to show what kind of the life of a sensitive immigrant artist who tried to make it in America. The other is to show how violent the IWW was. These two goals clash, and in very jarring ways. Joe Hill talks about killing the "Bush Wah", and the alternative theory given to what Joe Hill was doing the night of the murders was that he was busy killing a labour spy (yes, really).
I think such a treatment (the pulp adventure) works best when it plays up the wild west nature of turn of the century southwest. And it was a missed opportunity to not take a look at Joe Hills participation in the Mexican Revolution. But other then that, it doesn't really “work”.
Overall, it's not a terrible book; it is what it is, a 60's pulp paperback, nothing more and nothing less. One should go into it without illusions.
This book is orange juice: Pure Pulp. On the back page, it's main advertisements by the publisher is for men's sports adventure books. As such, it's focus is not in the character study of Joe Hill the man, but the sort of thing you'd find in the 50s/60s pulp magazines; harrowing tales of violence and sex. And while I do enjoy that kind of thing, shoehorning it into the story of Joe Hill's life really doesn't produce the desired effect.
In essence, the book has two main purposes. One is to show what kind of the life of a sensitive immigrant artist who tried to make it in America. The other is to show how violent the IWW was. These two goals clash, and in very jarring ways. Joe Hill talks about killing the "Bush Wah", and the alternative theory given to what Joe Hill was doing the night of the murders was that he was busy killing a labour spy (yes, really).
I think such a treatment (the pulp adventure) works best when it plays up the wild west nature of turn of the century southwest. And it was a missed opportunity to not take a look at Joe Hills participation in the Mexican Revolution. But other then that, it doesn't really “work”.
Overall, it's not a terrible book; it is what it is, a 60's pulp paperback, nothing more and nothing less. One should go into it without illusions.
Displaying 1 of 1 review