THE LAST PARALLEL

by Martin Russ ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 3, 1956

Russ went to the Korean War with the ribald impiety of the college boy, a passion for jazz, a lingo devastatingly hyper-modern, and a fixed notion that being a Marine was a hilarious joke thought up by a pack of cretins. In his jagged, haphazard way, wonderfully assassinating the King's English by any verbal somersaults he fancies, Russ gives a picture of Korean trench-fighting reminiscent of the early Cummings and sometimes of Laurence Sterne. Nothing very much happens; there's a series of half-hearted raids and patrols, a precise account of equipment, a tally of obscenities in vogue and the variety of methods for baiting the nearby Chinese, etc. Occasionally a Marine is wounded or an enemy flashlight retrieved or the Marines talk too noisily -- and all this varies the prevailing, suffocating monotony. A new stratagem for ambushing a patrol or for wiping out a listening post is devised. Russ has no story to tell -- he is neither a hero nor a symbol nor even a keen observer -- but (and this is a big, important but) he is simply a hugely gifted young writer, painfully and somehow proudly outgrowing his own immaturity. An original for special consideration.

Pub Date: Jan. 3, 1956

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Rinehart

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1956

Categories: NONFICTION