The Naked and the Dead

Norman Mailer’s The Naked and the Dead, when it was published in 1948, was proclaimed as one of the first great novels that described the reality on the ground for U.S. soldiers on the front lines during World War II. The novel recreates an imagined invasion of a Japanese held island in the Pacific in the later stages of the war. What made the novel special at the time was Mailer’s ability to present the vernacular of the common soldier as they dealt with the stresses of the daily threat of death and the interaction of various cultures working side by side. This includes the prejudices against soldiers from the South, northern Jews, and Mexican-Americans trying to prove their loyalty to a country that had yet to accept their show more presence. It depicts not a melting pot, but rather its uncomfortable fit.

The book’s cast focuses on a single platoon, a major sent to lead them on a recon mission, and a general in charge of the island’s invasion. Mailer includes flashbacks in the lives of individual soldiers to provide the reader with portraits that help to explain their thoughts and actions during the attack. Instead of focusing on the intensity of battle, he reveals the boredom that accompanies these soldiers fearing what might await them on the next day. When death does present itself, it takes the soldiers and reader by surprise. These sections stand out, but what makes this novel special is its ability to present the daily actions of the soldiers who are intent on survival, having realized how fragile their courage is.

The Naked and the Dead recreates the toll of warfare, not by detailing the horrors of actual battle, but by showing the effects of its near presence. It evokes in each soldier their prejudices, the desire for self preservation, and the crippling effects of fear. Despite this, it shows how such a multicultural platoon continues to obey orders even if it means death might result. This is a novel that continues to resound despite all the other war novels that have followed it. It was Mailer’s first, and certainly his best. show less

An incredible read. This is probably the fastest I’ve ever read a 700 page book, and most likely the only time I’ve felt that not a single word of it was wasted. True it’s dated, and again, true, many if not all of the characters exist on the unlikable side of realistic depictions. But for me it all added up to a grand epic of the pacific theatre in world war 2. Made much more profound by how much of it is trivialized by both the day to day drudgeries of military life (with idealism left for the cynics to tear a part or as propaganda for posters) and the turns of the story. Many characters are introduced and just as many are killed off. Some events and people are detailed, others aren’t. But it all holds together more or less show more seamlessly. With this book Mailer has created one of the most profound, humbling, and bleak images of warfare since “All Quiet on the Western Front”. Give it a chance (and a lot of time) and you won’t be disappointed. show less

I don’t know what took me so long, but I finally got around to reading Norman Mailer’s highly acclaimed World War II novel, the Naked and the Dead. Having read a number of World War II novels and seen quite a few movies and mini-series (most recently HBO’s The Pacific), this story can come across as old and clichéd, but it must be remembered that this is the original.

Every World War II story that focuses on the front line foot soldier has its crusty, battle hardened sergeant, its southern redneck, its cerebral Jewish private who must endure the blatant and constant anti-Semitism. Most include a callow Lieutenant who must be nurse maided by his experienced NCOs and clueless upper brass who mindlessly feed front line troops into show more the meat grinder. At least this novel is somewhat different in that regard.

However, clichés and stereotypes develop for a reason. World War II platoons DID feature a broad cross section of American soldiers; southern, Jewish, racist, intellectual, stupid, brave, cowardly. Most units probably included a battle hardened First Sergeant (if they were lucky). And again, this was the first. At the time it was published, it was almost certainly ground breaking in its portrayal of the Pacific theater of the war.

If I had one complaint, it was that virtually every single character in the entire book was unlikeable. It’s hard to believe that Mailer couldn’t find a single character to imbue with positive personality traits that weren’t overwhelmingly swamped with negatives.

The writing is very descriptive, sometimes excessively so. I never thought an author could write 100 pages of prose describing how tired soldiers could be. Long periods pass with little or no action and there is really no “payoff” in the end. Nevertheless, as a historically significant work, the importance of the novel cannot be over stressed. As a current day reading experience, however, it suffers from having been done over and over and over again. show less

The Naked and the Dead slowly grew on me. At first, I was a little confused by the myriad of characters, failed to get into the plot, and continued to put it down. Once I gave it a long, continuous reading time, and, admittedly, as more of the flashback sections were developed, I was hooked. For me, The Naked and the Dead was more about character than about war. It was the story of ordinary men being put in an extraordinary and physically demanding situations. Some rose to the occasion specatularly and unexpectedly, learning of their inner strength and talents stunted by societal expectations. Others, understandably, dreamt only of returning to the normalacy of home. Mailer also tells the story of stangers from hugely varying show more backgrounds (a mix only a country like America could provide) coming together to find some equilibrium of forced tolerance. Fuggin' long an' fuggin good. show less

Near the end of this book Sgt. Brown says that part of war is "finding out things about yourself that, by God, it don't pay to know."

The key to this book is viewing it as an examination of man's warring impulses. The General, Lt. Hearn and each man in the platoon fight an internal war, between what he believes he is and what he really is.

The plot concerns a campaign to control the South Pacific island of Anopopei, but the plot, like Mount Anaka, is the tip of the psychological iceberg.

The island itself can be seen as the mind of one man, and the soldiers as the ideas, and ideals, that inhabit it. Goldstein and Ridges embody the superego, or the Judeo-Christian values that we give lip service to. Croft embodies the bloodthirsty id, the show more male urge to explore and conquer. Wilson is the libido. The General and Hearn are the intellect, carrying on a philosophical war between ideas of liberalism and fascism.

In the end, no one facet predominates. The Army, like the mind itself, behaves as it does as a result of these warring impulses, urges, and ideas. The conclusion is that man is very much an animal, despite his ability to analyze and scheme. show less

Meet General Cumming, arrogant and blundering. Gallagher is only twenty years old with a pregnant wife back home. Look out for Sergeant Croft because he is mean. Red grew up in a mining town. The idea that any man, from any walk of life, can experience the horror of war as equals.
Norman Mailer takes you inside the mind of a solider. The long nights in a foxhole keeping watch and the raging thoughts that go through a soldier's head: paranoid about the enemy's location, wondering about his girl back home. The twisted sense of right and wrong: a soldier can be devastated after the torture and killing of an insect, but feel nothing for doing the same to his Japanese enemy. Writing letters back home: being diplomatic about what a soldier show more could or could not say. Even though they were not sure what they were fighting for, a soldier could not admit that to his family. By stepping back in time before each character became a soldier was a way for Mailer to humanize his characters even further. Some escaped fatherhood by enlisting. Others needed to prove their toughness for fear of seeming too sensitive and weak as little boys.
Mailer's attention to detail brings his reader right into the jungle fighting. The way water seeps into greased "waterproof" shoes. The way a forty pound pack gets heavier with the weight of water. What they carried and how they carried it. Obviously, Mailer speaks with experience. Heartbreakingly so. show less

Don’t ask me what I was thinking, but I could have sworn “The Naked and the Dead” was a noir detective novel. Whoops. Wrong. I open up the pages and find myself on a Pacific Island in the middle of the war with Japan. So, I think to myself, here comes the war novel – hang on for the battle. Nope, wrong again.

Instead, what I found was a story about tedium and boredom interspersed with rare moments of panic. Real war. Eventually, the story turns and becomes one of men sent on a senseless recon. In other words, an anti-war novel. It does its job well.

A few battles stories are told, and there is the story of men responding to unquestioned authority. But this is not a story that focuses on those aspects. Rather, it focuses on the show more stories that are the men that populate this tale; men – most of them not particularly nice – thrown together by a cataclysmic event. And, as such, the book is a reminder that heroic war stories are much more fiction than we want to admit. The story of a band of brothers who bond is turned on its ear in this book. Instead, the men pull together, but only when they really have to. And there is no love lost, only the false camaraderie that comes from experiencing hell and stupidity together. They work together, they survive together, they buddy together, but they still do not like each other

At times, the tedium of the book becomes wearying and, while the characters are vividly drawn (the flashbacks to their previous lives are quite effective), it was still possible to occasionally mix up some of the bigger dolts. The anti-war aspects are well drawn and the message is delivered in the proper amounts, but there is something (maybe it is just too real) that makes me unsure whether I really like this book or not. show less