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Title: The Gangs of New York: An Informal History of the Underworld by Herbert Asbury, Jorge Luis Borges ISBN: 1-56025-275-8 Publisher: Thunder's Mouth Press Pub. Date: 10 October, 2001 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.7 (37 reviews)
Rating: 2
Summary: Vintage folklore
Comment: For a book that purports to be a saga of history, "Gangs of New York" reads more like myth. Asbury's writing style inclines one to believe these are tales he's fabricated in the back of some bar rather than discover them in the depths of a research library. Though certain accounts (such as that of the Draft Riots) are certainly historically accurate, some passages read like sections of Paul Bunyan tall tales, including one detailing a gangster who had the lung-power to blow ships out of the East River.
Whether Asbury meant to mix fact and legend so fluently is unspecified. Still, even a figurative reading of the book seems a bit to colloquial. For a tale of "blood and gore" it was unexpectedly boring, owing to the sometimes overdetailed accounts of gang-related occurrences. This is one work for which I can say the movie is far more entertaining- though, of course, the movie mixes and matches aspects of the book at will, making it a sort of second derivative attempt.
Read Asbury's book as a sort of escapist crime drama, not as a serious historical work chronicling what was happening on the streets of New York.
Rating: 4
Summary: The Gangs of New York
Comment: The use of literary devices on this piece of excellent literature was very strong. First of all the were parts of this novel where you thought you were in New York's infamous Five Points the early 1900's. Asbury's use of imagry was just amazing. He made you think you were in a scene with all of the description he used. Even if it was one of those scenes where you were overcome with sadness and possibly even anger from the more grapic events of this novel. The characters were based on real life people who lived in that time period and the fit in awesome with the story. There was the typical evil stock character of "The Butcher." He fit in perfect with the overall felling of this book, which is one none of us would like to be involved in. The topic of it is gangs and life when things are not going so well. So obviosly the are going to be unfortunite things that happen. The tone of this novel was a very serious one with gore and violent death, and one could tell that Asbury wanted you to know this type of things really did happen. This leads to the theme which is loyality. The fact he writes about gangs is a symbol of unity. With there being death and murder involved then comes authorities. In most of the cases the gang members would rather die than be a 'rat', which would come with harsher and more brutal punishment. That summerized is loyality.
Rating: 4
Summary: A Book that is just plain entertaining
Comment: What to say about a book that was recently made into a movie robbed of its academy award to the horror of the movie "Chicago".Hmmmm...
Being a lad of only 19, I don't know how seriously this review will be taken, but I will say this; Gangs of New York by Asbury is a downright entertaining book.
I can honestly say that reading this book was "fun", unlike some of the books they force you to read in school. If one has any interest about the history of the new york gangs, this is the book to read. The writing is mainly anecdotes, with occasional police records throughout.
Is it far from what the movie was though. It is a history book, and if one doesn't like reading history related material, this book is not for you. Still, I don't see how reading about people being brutally murdered and robbed and gang war in general could be boring, but oh well.
The book is 300 plus pages, but is easy to read, though not for the light-going reader. The exploits of the gangs told are very brutal, and downright inhumane, but that is what makes it interesting. Bill the Butcher, Monk Eastman, and various others from the movie are introduced in it, but in different contexts. Still, learning that they were real beings makes for an exciting read
Still, i can't say its the perfect book, and some of it is boring, but one can overlook that in the fact that, for the most part, the stories are kept short and the anecdotes are over-embellished which makes it a good read. It is no War and Peace, but its almost like a modern day thriller and probably better. Hope this has been helpful.
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