Американски страсти

by Irwin Shaw, Ъруин Шоу, Кирил Цветков (Translator)

„Университетски град“ е популярен радиосериал. Срещу петима от неговите най-известни актьори финансирано по мистериозен начин списание готви компромат. Спонсорът на предаването е обезпокоен, това застрашава икономическите му интереси. Ще бъдат ли актьорите пожертвани?
Клемънт Арчър — режисьорът на предаването — е човекът, който трябва да реши тяхната съдба. Ако успее да докаже невинността им, те ще бъдат спасени. И петимата са дългогодишни негови колеги. Но познава ли ги добре? Толкова безупречен ли е съвършеният Вик Херес — неговият най-близък приятел? А сексапилната и безспорно много талантлива Франсез Мадъруел? Дали единственият й недостатък е, че обича да унижава мъжете, с които е била близка, и то на многолюдни места?

Ще успее ли Арчър да им помогне, или също ще затъне в блатото на лъжите, обвиненията и полуистините ?

Genres: Fiction, Historical Fiction, Novels

480 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1951

About the author

Shaw was born Irwin Gilbert Shamforoff in the South Bronx, New York City, to Russian Jewish immigrants. Shaw was a prolific American playwright, screenwriter, novelist, and short-story author whose written works have sold more than 14 million copies. He is best known for his novels, The Young Lions (1948) and Rich Man Poor Man (1970).

His parents were Rose and Will. His younger brother, David Shaw (died 2007), became a noted Hollywood producer. Shortly after Irwin's birth, the Shamforoffs moved to Brooklyn. Irwin changed his surname upon entering college. He spent most of his youth in Brooklyn, where he graduated from Brooklyn College with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1934.

Shaw began screenwriting in 1935 at the age of 21, and scripted for several radio shows, including Dick Tracy, The Gumps and Studio One.

Shaw's first play, Bury the Dead (1936) was an expressionist drama about a group of soldiers killed in a battle who refuse to be buried. During the 1940s, Shaw wrote for a number of films, including Talk of the Town (a comedy about civil liberties), The Commandos Strike at Dawn (based on a C.S. Forester story about commandos in occupied Norway) and Easy Living (about a football player unable to enter the game due to a medical condition). Shaw married Marian Edwards. They had one son, Adam Shaw, born in 1950, himself a writer of magazine articles and non-fiction.

Shaw enlisted in the U.S. Army and was a warrant officer during World War II.He served with an Army documentary film unit. The Young Lions, Shaw's first novel, was published in 1949. Based on his experiences in Europe during the war, the novel was very successful and was adapted into a 1958 film.

Shaw's second novel, The Troubled Air, chronicling the rise of McCarthyism, was published in 1951. He was among those who signed a petition asking the U.S. Supreme Court to review the John Howard Lawson and Dalton Trumbo convictions for contempt of Congress, resulting from hearings by the House Committee on Un-American Activities. Falsely accused of being a communist by the Red Channels publication, Shaw was placed on the Hollywood blacklist by the movie studio bosses. In 1951 he left the United States and went to Europe, where he lived for 25 years, mostly in Paris and Switzerland. He later claimed that the blacklist "only glancingly bruised" his career. During the 1950s he wrote several more screenplays, including Desire Under the Elms (based on Eugene O'Neill's play) and Fire Down Below (about a tramp boat in the Caribbean).

While living in Europe, Shaw wrote more bestselling books, notably Lucy Crown (1956), Two Weeks in Another Town (1960), Rich Man, Poor Man (1970) (for which he would later write a less successful sequel entitled Beggarman, Thief) and Evening in Byzantium (made into a 1978 TV movie). Rich Man, Poor Man was adapted into a highly successful ABC television miniseries in 1976.

His novel Top of the Hill, about the Winter Olympics at Lake Placid in 1980, was made into a TV movie, starring Wayne Rogers, Adrienne Barbeau, and Sonny Bono.

His last two novels were Bread Upon the Waters (1981) and Acceptable Losses (1982).

Shaw died in Davos, Switzerland on May 16, 1984, aged 71, after undergoing treatment for prostate cancer.

Reviews

[Lynda · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was the longest time I've ever spent reading an Irwin Shaw novel. I somehow thought this would be one of his better written ones, as the Red Scare had personally affected him. Turns out I was wrong.

"The Troubled Air" concerns Clement Archer, the director of a popular radio program. Archer is a well-liked man in his forties, who is dealing with his wife's pregnancy as well as his teenage daughter's nearing venture into adulthood.

In the midst of his quiet life, Archer is told that he must release several actors as well as the composer from the show. Concerned and confused, he inquires into the reasoning behind their impending dismissal. Archer is informed that the show's sponsor has received a listing of individuals who have reportedly been involved in Communist activities. The actors and the show's composer are among those listed. Believing this to be untrue, Archers' relentlessness allows him to be provided the opportunity to conduct a two-week investigation. He meets with each of them, some of who have become aware that their employment is in jeopardy. However, Archer is most concerned of Vic Herres, one of the accused. Herres is Archer's best friend and former pupil. Archer's investigation finds that of everyone, only one of the actors is an open communist. Others may only have been previously involved in activities that are currently perceived as communist friendly. Before Archer can reveal his findings, he is told that he must dismiss everyone in spite of his investigation.

In hopes of preventing their release, Archer breaks the token rule of personally contacting the sponsor. He flies to Philadelphia to speak with Mr. Sandler, the show's secretive sponsor. Sandler listens intently to Archer's findings. However, his strong stance on anti-communism reveals to Archer that saving every one of the accused is unlikely. After some discussion, Sandler allows two of the actors to stay on so long as Archer personally vouches for them and swears they're not communists. As a result, Alice Weller and Herres are allowed to keep their positions.

Yet, all is not well upon his return. Archer is perceived by his colleagues as a collaborator with the groups behind the growing dismissals of actors and others associated with the entertainment industry. The public regards Archer as a communist sympathizer. His personal life comes crashing down at the same time as his professional. The decision to prevent his family from becoming fully aware of the growing problems he is facing has large consequences.

Eventually, Archer realizes that his life is far from perfect. He is immersed in much more than he can handle, and he discovers his wife's unhappiness. In the midst of chaos, Archer is fired as it has been discovered that Herres is a very prominent communist. His wife goes into early labor and they lose the baby. The Red Scare has only just begun and their future is uncertain. In spite of everything, Archer is prepared to face whatever awaits.

As previously stated, I expected so much more of this novel. The tone was extremely bleak but Shaw would have been far more successful had he featured a much more interesting main character. While Archer was certainly noble in his fight, he was extremely naive and delusional about the reality of everything. I so would have preferred if Shaw had chosen to focus on O'Neill or Herres who likely had a far interesting tale, and knew a great deal more. I was annoyed by Shaw's decision to portray women as either pathetically weak, or strong-willed with the incapability of handling emotion. It was almost as though each and every women mentioned was a nuisance that had to be handled gently. Strangely enough, I was happiest when Archer's wife finally confronts him as there is finally someone shown with some backbone.

All in all, as disappointed as I was, I found the book to be decent. Shaw progresses the story well.

[Chana T · Rating 3 out of 5]

I picked this book up in the library in my grandparents home. The cover was torn and the pages yellow. The perfect book. I read it whenever I got a chance. It kept me thinking. The writing was not lyrical, it was profound and true. when I reached the last chapter and was nearly done the book I turned the page only to notice that about 10 pages were missing. I won't be forgetting this one to soon

[Christopher Saunders · Rating 4 out of 5]

Written in 1951, Irwin Shaw's The Troubled Air was one of the first literary depictions of the postwar Red Scare, a subject which makes perfect fodder for political fiction. The story concerns Clement Archer, a radio director who's pressured to fire five performers suspected of Communist leanings, and his agonies trying to balance his own career with his conscience. Shaw never misses an opportunity to give someone an overripe position speech, so much of the novel consists of monologues explaining different characters' views on Communism, the Cold War, the blacklist, the entertainment industry, etc. And the novel's near-lack of humor and casual, if era-typical sexism (especially the treatment of Archer's wife, who typically just doesn't understand her husband's qualms over conscience) will turn off other readers. Nonetheless, it remains readable due to strongly etched characters, the protagonist's heart-rending dilemma, and its powerful indictment of social hysteria: the innocent are lumped together with the guilty, while the guilty are often "guilty" of no more than a passing affiliation with an unorthodox group. And the protagonist himself, despite his studied indecision, finds his refusal to take sides marking him as suspect, too. Shaw knows whereof he speaks: his own flirtations with the Left caused him to be named as a Communist in Red Channels, leading him to flee America to Europe before he could be formally blacklisted. Dated, overwrought, yet undeniably powerful as a portrait of a time, place and attitude.

[George · Rating 5 out of 5]

I imagine that this is one of the most striking novels about the blacklist that has ever been written. Published in 1951, it details, albeit fictionally, the insidious methods applied against the unsuspecting by the perpetrators, without the revisionism that would come in subsequent tomes. There is no doubt here that there was a conspiratorial communist movement; the moral question is whether or not its followers had the right and reason to their beliefs. Shaw, via his surrogate, radio director Clement Archer, undoubtedly believes they did while not subscribing to them personally and ultimately finding them just as restrictive and threatening as the system they challenged. Clement and his family are caught up in a firestorm as he is found dispensable by both sides.

Shaw is a wonderful novelist, and his depiction here of the world of radio theatre as it and its inhabitants came to be torn apart by warring interests is vivid and gripping, a true page-turner.

It is amazing that anyone dared to write this book at the height of the "Red scare." It would have made a wonderful 50s film, although there was no way in hell Hollywood would have touched it at that time.

[Alan Menachemson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although the style is dated and the soliloquy’s are tedious this is well worth reading for perspective. Shaw is one of the most underrated authors of the 20th century. The McCarthyism focus in this book only serves to remind us of a gentler era where there were no REAL worries and people could indulge their anxieties in a manner that, today, seems bizarre . Whatever the stresses in the early fifties were, we experience them multifold now. And the social rifts he bemoaned were of a sort any reasonable person would yearn for, in this age of technologically enabled polarization. One of his characters says that people’s inherent moralities and barbarism have not changed since land was first settled, just the methodology. If anyone reading this has the time to review the book, I’d love to know what you think

[Gimena Reche · Rating 3 out of 5]

Este libro se encontraba en la biblioteca de mi mamá. Se lo pedí prestado y jamás volvió a sus manos. Igual, ella me lo regaló.
Es una historia interesante que tiene como base el comunismo. Tranquilamente puede calificarse como una novela de espías. Si tienen la suerte de conseguirlo, denle una oportunidad.

[SA · Rating 5 out of 5]

another piece of excellent narration of troubled times early fifties usa.

[Mike · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good story but packed with typos.

[Mochi · Rating 4 out of 5]

I knew exactly what my review of this book was. I was going to say how I'm not a very political person and I chose to read this book not because of the topic (despite it, actually) but because it was Irwin Shaw and this was the only novel of his left that I haven't read. I was going to write about how I had to keep reminding myself that times were different, people were trying to figure things out and it's normal that it was such a big deal, even though I'm not educated enough on the subject and don't have an interest to be. Furthermore, I was fully prepared to talk about Kitty and how awful she was and how every time she showed up I groaned out loud. Or how weird Archer is as a protagonist, how timid, placid, fluid, passive he was even when he tried to act.
And then I read the last ~100 pages and fell in love with Irwin Shaw all over again. Such complexity, such a sober, albeit dark, realism. Everything fell right in its place, so genuine and true to the times we're living in now that it wasn't even surprising. And it didn't matter anymore whether it was communism or fascism because the names might have changed, the ideals might have changed but people haven't and they never will and amongst the tangled web of politics and back stabbing, in the center of it all, lies humanity in its ugliest, most honest and brutal, hateful, emotional, weak. A liar.
I still dislike Kitty and her "redemption" which, I have a feeling, Archer has seen many many times, but I see why she was necessary and why their baby was not.
It's scary how relevant this book is and how much easier it is today to bring someone to their knees, without even having to hide yourself. Times sure have changed and yet, remain exactly the same.

[Sonny Br · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Communist witch hunt of the 1950s takes its toll on the entertainment industry in this gripping story with believable, nuanced characters and nicely drawn color about life in post-war New York. Shaw is a first-rate writer (the sort of fellow I'd like to be), and he tells a good tale here, as he did in The Young Lions and Lucy Crown.

In The Troubled Air, Shaw gives us a whole cast of secondary characters that are interesting and well developed, even if you despise some of them. But there's more. Shaw also has something larger to say about integrity and principles, and the agonizing conflicts public figures faced during the Red scare. No doubt that's because Shaw himself was blacklisted during the Red scare. I can't wait to read more of Shaw's work. He reminds me of Herman Wouk -- not surprising, since they come from the same city and the same era.

[Otis · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was an extremely well written book. Its crazy how well it holds up for being written in 1951, the language is still very readable and interesting and a lot of the points are still super thought provoking and relevant today. A lot of plot twists that I didnt expect and the ending was a lot darker than I expected. It wasnt the climactic ending I expected but it still felt very satisfying. I wish we could see what happens next and I’m curious what Archer meant when he said he was going to oppose Herres forever.

[Eric McDowell · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the first Irwin Shaw novel I have read, and I was bowled over by the strength of the writing. Shaw is a master of plot development and characterization. At times, I winced at the main character's misogyny; but sadly, it reflected how this was considered acceptable in 1951, when the book was published. Otherwise, it was a thoroughly engrossing read with several memorable scenes and characters.

[Margob99 · Rating 4 out of 5]

Shaw is such an assured writer, this book a pleasure to read, regardless of the misogyny reflective of his era, regardless of the text filled with typos. He writes so well. He is indeed one of the more underrated authors of the twentieth century. I thoroughly enjoyed this story, albeit something of a Greek tragedy. His protagonists always find redemption even in the ruins. It is a relief to find such a good read.

[Ciro Cicogna · Rating 1 out of 5]

l'unica roba decente di Irwin Shaw è che è il prototipo di intellettuale americano che non sa un cazzo, si ritrova bersagliato da un mondo che amava perché in sostanza era un idiota e invece che comprende le origini del problema (e altri punti di vista diciamo oltre al liberalismo) si mette a piangere e a dire ueee mondo cattivo.
BRACCIA RUBATE ALL'ALLEVAMENTO ETICO che è una cosa che sicuramente avrebbe sostenuto

[Valerie · Rating 1 out of 5]

Giving this the lowest rating possible because I read the Kindle version and it was so poorly edited, full of typos, missing text, random words and punctuation in odd places, which made it a chore to read. The plot itself was good, loosely based on the author’s experience in radio and being blacklisted as a suspected “communist” in the 1950’s. If you are interested in the McCarthy era and want to check it out, get a hard copy.

[Frances Ross · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great and important book by an extremely talented author

This is a gripping tale. I DIDN’t want it to end. The characters were so real and well described that I knew and understood them.

[Corinne Driscoll · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not a fan of Shaw’s style of writing. This story of the 1950’s Communist witch hunt and the blacklist felt outdated, preachy, and unsure of its theme and meaning.

[Yvette E Somekh]

I love Irwin Shaw. His writing is perfect. The story is compelling even today. Please, please read this book

[martha · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am huge Shaw fan. The writing is great.
The subject gets old. Wished it was shorter. But still liked it

[Charles Ray · Rating 5 out of 5]

In the 1950s, the U.S. was reeling under the onslaught of Senator Joseph ‘Tail Gunner Joe’ McCarthy’s ‘lists’ of communists and communist sympathizers in government, and the entertainment industry maintained blacklists of artists and executives suspected of being fellow travelers. Many people, on the basis of nothing more than accusations, were deprived of their livelihoods or driven to exile or suicide.
In this troubled time, Clement Archer was the director of a popular radio show. His producer ordered him to fire five of his top performers because of a threat by a right-wing rag to publish the allegations if they were not dismissed. Archer finds himself caught between the practical path—obey and keep his job—and following his core beliefs of fairness and justice.
The Troubled Air by the late Irwin Shaw follows Archer on his torturous journey of self-discovery and confrontation, showing how cowardice can lead to betrayal, and how a determined few can intimidate the multitudes through bullying, lying, and coercion. Though fiction, it contains more than a grain of truth, and is worthwhile reading in our currently polarized political climate.
Shaw writes with the knowledge of someone who experienced the travails of the ‘Red Scare’ years. Falsely accused of being a member of the Communist Party in 1951, Shaw left his native land and lived abroad until his death in the 1980s. Unlike many victims of the witch hunts of the era, he was able at least to rebuild his career, going on to produce many outstanding works.
Anyone who wants to understand the human cost of political intimidation should read this book.

[Fred]

It was a GIANT soap opera.

[Ramon4 · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not one of Shaw's best

[Joubin · Rating 4 out of 5]

The story is so well-written that it makes you get along with it from the very beginning.