Summer Crossing; Truman Capote
I'm not sure that Truman Capote needs an introduction but I'm beginning to realize that I'm as old as I am and what was so important in my youth has faded into the mists of history.
Msgr. Capote wrote fictional stories about real people. Not heroes and villains, but real people stumbling through life, making frivolous decisions with consequential results. The world he wrote about was the one that existed in the AMC series Madmen. You actually might say correctly that Madmen was set in Msgr. Capote's New York City. I've lived some of that world. Not New York City, although it's where my parents met in the 50's, but the suburbs of Chicago. My childhood is what happened to all that opportunity that glowed so bright in the post war era. Truman Capote scratched at gilding on the cage that we were all so proud of.
Summer Crossing was written in 1946 and is considered his first novel but never published by Capote nor ever mentioned to any of his friends while he was alive. It was found amongst documents disposed of by Msgr. Capote in the early 1950’s but salvaged by his apartment building superintendent at the time. He in turn put them away for 50 years. This work was finally published in 2005 by Truman Capote's literary trust.
Summer Crossing is the story of two young people; a rebellious, spoiled, not quite 18yo girl and a twenty-something boy who had served and been discharged at the end of the war. There is a Romeo and Juliet element as the two star crossed lovers spend a frivolous Summer together, which leads to a consequential Autumn.
There's not much I can say past that without spoilers. It's not a long read, I finished in a lazy couple of sittings and that's a good description of the writing. Msgr. Capote is a lazy read, the prose just pulls you along like floating along on a slow, winding river. Ahead lies… perhaps rapids and eventually the sea, but that's ahead…
