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All the Kings Men Play (Play Version)
Binding: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 812
EAN: 9780394405025
ISBN: 0394405021
Label: Random House
Manufacturer: Random House
Number Of Items: 1
Publication Date: March 12, 1960
Publisher: Random House
Release Date: March 12, 1960
Studio: Random House
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Editorial Review:
This landmark book is a loosely fictionalized account of Governor Huey Long of Louisiana, one of the nation's most astounding politicians. All the King's Men tells the story of Willie Stark, a southern-fried politician who builds support by appealing to the common man and playing dirty politics with the best of the back-room deal-makers. Though Stark quickly sheds his idealism, his right-hand man, Jack Burden -- who narrates the story -- retains it and proves to be a thorn in the new governor's side. Stark becomes a successful leader, but at a very high price, one that eventually costs him his life. The award-winning book is a play of politics, society and personal affairs, all wrapped in the cloak of history.
One of the great classics of American fiction reissued as it was originally written.Winner of the 1947 Pulitzer Prize, All the King's Men is one of the most famous and widely read works in American fiction. Its original publication by Harcourt catapulted author Robert Penn Warren to fame and made the novel a bestseller for many seasons. Set in the 1930s, it traces the rise and fall of demagogue Willie Talos, a fictional Southern politician who resembles the real-life Huey "Kingfish" Long of Louisiana. Talos begins his career as an idealistic man of the people, but he soon becomes corrupted by success, caught between dreams of service and a lust for power. All the King's Men is as relevant today as it was fifty years ago.In a momentous publishing event, Robert Penn Warren's masterpiece has been restored and reintroduced by literary scholar Noel Polk, whose work on the texts of William Faulkner has proved so important to American literature. Polk presents the novel as it was originally written, and without the deletions required by its original editors. The result restores Warren's complexity and subtlety to an already near-perfect work, charging the characters with an energy and a more tangled web of relationships than previously was available. All the King's Men is a landmark in letters. This new edition brings it fully to life."The publication of a new, corrected edition of All the King's Men is welcome
news for all who care about American literature. Robert Penn Warren's
prize-winning novel has remained a classic since its publication more than half
a century ago. Editor Noel Polk has studied the manuscript and all other
available versions of Warren's finest novels, eliminating errors and retrieving deleted material. The result has been to enrich the character of narrator
Jack Burden and his protagonist, Willie Talos, in this story of tumultuous Louisiana politics which also has implications for morals and manners in the modern world." -Joseph Blotner, author of Robert Penn Warren: A Biography
Customer Reviews
Average Rating: 
Rating:  - Why did I wait?
I was assigned this book in an undergrad political science class. I began it and didn't finish it--I suppose because of immaturity. Thirty years later I decided to give it another try.
In short, this is one of the best novels I've read, and one of the few books that I want to re-read.
Rating: - A Great Book Read By A Great Voice
Accidentally picking this up at the library in the audio book section, I gave the first CD a listen and was hooked throughout all 18 CD's in this large, vast and powerful read.
All The King's Men was originally pulped in 1946 by Robert Penn Warren, and it is a tale about the corruption of a powerful man
I have to get really geeky here and talk about some pop TV for a second. The character Benjamin Linus on ABC's Lost is played by Michael Emerson is one of my favorite TV ... Read More
Rating: - great literature, sinfully delicious
I read the 1963 edition by Time Inc. This 600 page book is an incredible read, an extremely well written page turner, very visual writing with colorful chanracters that are so real and alive. The book is filled with intriguing events but so skillfully layered and woven with seamless transitions into monologues by the narrator about his reflections on life, history, good and evil, and many more. This is the best book I have read this year so far.
Rating: - The Web Of Things
I put off reading this novel for almost twenty years from when it was first recommended to me for the simple reason that I dismissed as a "political" novel and, ergo, not of the first water. - How wrong can a prospective reader be?!? - To begin, this is not a "political" novel, per se, and the character of Willie Stark, as compared with the odyssey of Jack Burden, not very gripping. As another reviewer has mentioned, it is only political in the way that Oedipus Rex is political. What All The King's ... Read More
Rating:  - Not For The Uncommitted
Knowing only that "Robert Penn Warren" was a famous author of some kind, I blindly plucked this book from the shelf of a local library. As I read - - which was sometimes feverish, and sometimes with some amount of irritation - - I did not pursue any reviews or advance information regarding the plot, the characters, or the author's language. That said, I formed my opinion based entirely on my own feelings, as a person living in the 21st century who is exposed to today's barrage of media, television, literature, ... Read More
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