Significance
Anyone born during the first quarter of the 20th century was inevitably marked by the great economic depression of the 1930s. Then WWII profoundly and permanently changed society. Both of these major influences affect Glendon Swarthout’s 16 novels, particularly those set in the Midwest. Welcome to Thebes (1962), Loveland (1968) and Pinch Me, I Must Be Dreaming (1994) depict how the problems of adults affect their children, especially youth trying to adapt to an adult world. Although They Came to Cordura (1958) is set in Mexico at the time of the 1916 border dispute with Pancho Villa, its analysis of the nature of courage was influenced by Swarthout’s wartime experiences. Teaching freshman honors English classes gave Swarthout insight into the mating rituals of college students on the beaches of Fort Lauderdale during spring break, and his hit Where The Boys Are (1960) definitely presaged the anti-war protests that occurred on American college campuses later in the decade. A Christmas Gift (1977, also known as The Melodeon) is an exception to Glendon’s other work in several respects. It suggests a farewell tribute to his Michigan ancestors and his awareness of their tradition of understanding and concern for others.
With the conspicuous exception of A Christmas Gift, all of Swarthout’s novels are infused with a sardonic spirit, usually in respect to examples of the cruelty and viciousness of which man is capable. His greatest bestseller, Bless the Beasts and Children is a good example of this distinguishing literary trait. Another common theme of his writings is his study of courage, the extraordinary heroism of which otherwise common, ordinary men are sometimes capable, given the right circumstances. In setting free a doomed herd of buffalo, the group of mentally disturbed teenagers in Beasts demonstrate valor during harrowing conditions. The style of Swarthout’s writing is fundamentally dispassionate, however, and written in a clear, linear, pictorial style, which is why so many of his stories were adapted well to film. Swarthout was a great admirer of Somerset Maugham (whom he studied along with Ernest Hemingway and Joyce Cary as part of his doctoral thesis in Literature) and humorist Charles Portis, who influenced his writing.
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“The hypothesis I wish to advance is that ... the language of morality is in ... grave disorder.... What we possess, if this is true, are the fragments of a conceptual scheme, parts of which now lack those contexts from which their significance derived. We possess indeed simulacra of morality, we continue to use many of the key expressions. But we have—very largely if not entirely—lost our comprehension, both theoretical and practical, of morality.”
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