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A classic restored -- the complete and unexpurgated text of the first, most powerful, and most autobiographical novel of this great African-American writer.In 1937 Chester Himes, newly released from a seven-year stretch in the Ohio State Penitentiary for grand larceny, finished his first novel, Yesterday Will Make You Cry. By turns brutal and lyrical and never less than totally honest, it tells the autobiographical story of young Jimmy Monroe's passage through the prison system, which tests the limits of his sanity, his capacity for suffering, and his definition of love. Stunningly candid about racism, homosexuality, and prison corruption, the book would take sixteen years and four subsequent revisions before being published in much altered form as Cast the First Stone in 1952. Even bowdlerized, it was recognized as a sardonic masterpiece of debasement and transfiguration.This edition presents for the first time the book precisely as Himes intended it to be read, with its raw honesty andstartling compassion entirely intact. It now stands definitively as one of the great novels of prison life and one of Himes's most enduring literary achievements.… (more)
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Not only is it a hard hitting, instense and powerful story looking at prison life in the 50s, it is also a deeper look at disechanted youth. Split into 3 parts with a the harsh story of prison life bookending the middle section showing an angry, intelligent, self centered guy who blows all his chances for instead quick and easy excitement. Whilst thstructure lessens the impact of the constant daily fight that depth more than makes up for it, it is an honest and unflinching look as well as a dramatic one.
Historically its fascinating, maybe more so as you know its based on Himes actual life but it also resonates today. It's not harshness that stood out for me but the loss of freedom and lack of direction, the loneliness and desperation and also the hope. All darkness needs light. Take the part where the story looks at how stories helped and hindered the long stay at prison its both disturbing and wonderufl at the same time.
Chester Himes writes (when he desires) raw, powerful, disturbing novels. Cast the First Stone was a brilliant, simmering story and with that it
I really wasn't disappointed, this story encompasses the horror and loneliness of a 20 year stretch. You can actually feel the unremitting hopelessness; the pettiness and the boredom interspersed with extreme violence. Himes and therefore his character witness some pretty horrible stuff, the prison fire is an eye opener to hell. However its not really too bleak, there is hope too as eventually finds a way out, but utlimately it feels real. The protagonist does not become a saint and runs the full gammit of emotion but in the end you feel a change is possible, his life isnt futile after all.
Of course it had its problems; With one eye on the era (50s) I forgave the toned down (oddly platonic) homsexual relationship and read between the lines. It tended to meander at times too, which life would being in prison for so long but in a tight 1st person story I think it was too noticeable.