Walker Percy's The Moviegoer at Fifty: New Takes on an Iconic American Novel

by Jennifer Levasseur (Editor), Mary A. McCay (Editor)

More than fifty years after its publication, Walker Percy's National Book Award Winner, The Moviegoer, still confronts, comforts, and enlightens generations of readers. This collection of twelve new essays, edited and introduced by Jennifer Levasseur and Mary A. McCay, emphasize the evolving significance of this seminal, New Orleans novel. Authors' consider the text with diverse perspectives, drawing from philosophy, theology, disability theory, contemporary music and literature, social media, and film studies.

Jay Tolson opens the volume with reflections on rereading the novel on a Kindle decades after writing his important biography of Percy. H. Collin Messer, Montserrat Gin�s, Jessica Hooten Wilson, and Brian Jobe follow with illuminating essays analyzing Percy's influences, from St. Augustine and Cervantes to Heidegger and Dostoevsky. Jonathan Potter and Read Mercer Schuchardt, Mary A. McCay, Matthew Luter, and Dorian Speed delve into the novel's significance to cinema, including an exhaustive guide to its film references, a meditation on Binx Bolling as a director of his existence, and the semiotics of celebrity. Brent Walter Cline and Robert Bolton, Michael Kobre, and L. Lamar Nisly present a roadmap for Bolling's inward journey, exploring a variety of elements from the role of the broken body to the spiritual connection to Bruce Springsteen lyrics.

Walker Percy's The Moviegoer at Fifty is the first critical work devoted solely to the author's debut novel. Coinciding with the centenary of Percy's birth, this collection invites both new and veteran readers to enjoy The Moviegoer with fresh perspectives that underscore its lasting relevance.

233 pages, Kindle Edition

First published April 11, 2016

Reviews

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting mix of essays based on the novel. Some are unintelligible (the first essay on St. Augustine), some are laughably ridiculous (the essay about Bruce Springsteen and Walker Percy) and some are extremely thoughtful and well written. This is not what I expected, but overall if you're a fan of Walker Percy (and The Moviegoer in particular) you will find this collection worthwhile.

One thing that has always confused me is that despite the novel winning the National Book Award, I've always considered The Moviegoer as just a book (lowercase b) and not a Book (capital B). This collection of essays makes a valiant effort of justifying it as a classic, but in the end it falls short.