Ernest Poole

Roger Gale, a media-monitoring business owner nearing retirement, observes life in early 20th century New York City through the eyes of his three daughters. The youngest, Laura, is a social butterfly always going to the latest excitements the city can offer. The middle, Edith, is a mother to four children, on whom she dotes. The oldest, Deborah, cares for her own “family,” tenement children and the poor trying to make it the new country they have made their home. Through each daughter, he sees the changing social order of New York in a new way.

When the old wooden bridge breaks, a young boy is delighted to be able to watch, from his front yard, the many different machines at work building the new bridge across the brook.

David Mamet's work as a playwright, essayist, director, and screenwriter has earned him a reputation as one of the most adventurous creative figures of our day. Now he turns his hand to fiction for the first time with The Village, a novel written with the explosive force and ferocious insight for which all Mamet's work is renowned. The Village brings to life a remote New England community full of dark undercurrents and brooding silences. One after another, the inhabitants of the village reveal themselves to us even as they conceal themselves from each other. Alternating vivid dialogue with the most private thoughts, the author takes us deep inside their secret selves, unfolding in particular the unspoken forces that shape relationships between men and women. These are unforgettable figures: an old hunter whose knowledge of the place is bone deep; a newcomer who chops firewood as his marriage expires; a slinky young woman whose every step unsettles the local males; a store owner fretting his way toward bankruptcy. Through a year the novel traces their lives, unfolding not one but a multitude of stories, revealing the profound interior drama of every human consciousness and the extraordinarily complex interconnections that animate the spirit of a place. Precisely observed and beautifully written, The Village is a landmark work from one of our most important writers.

Using the harbor of New York both as the physical background of his story and as a symbol. Mr. Poole tells the story of the life of a young man from childhood to the hour when he becomes converted to the need of the reorganization of society so as to secure social justice. A story which strikes the prevailing note of social unrest, but which is hopeful in tone. — Bacon, Corinne, compiler, Standard Catalog: Fiction Section (1923)