The Fortress of Solitude
“You could grow up in the city where history was made and still miss it all.”― Jonathan Lethem, The Fortress of Solitude
This ambitious and expansive work is organized as a semi-autobiographical epic about memory, race, and class. The unlikely friendship between two boys, Dylan Ebdus, who is white and Jewish, and Mingus Rude, who is Black, is the main focus of the book. They are neighbors growing up in a gentrifying area of Brooklyn in the 1970s.
The intricate and changing friendship between Dylan and Mingus serves as the main plot point. Their bond successfully negotiates the racial tensions of their neighborhood and the larger social landscape of the late 20th century, and Lethem is commended for his nuanced and genuine depiction of their relationship. The self-assured and culturally aware Mingus provides Dylan, a "funky white boy" who feels alienated, with a sense of belonging.
There are two major sections to the novel. The first, which centers on the boys' early and teenage years, is superb because it tells a story in great detail and with a lot of emotion. Nonetheless, the book's second half, which centers on Dylan as an adult and his attempts to understand his past, shows a decline. This section is frequently characterized as feeling hurried, less coherent, and lacking the earlier section's momentum.
It is a "big, personal, sometimes breathtaking" book that deftly and nuancedly addresses difficult and significant subjects. The novel's strengths are its sensitive examination of friendship and race, its skillful evocation of a time and place, and its potent use of language.
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