 Penguin Modern Classics Cover |
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| Author | Thornton Wilder |
|---|---|
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Novel |
| Publisher | Penguin |
| Publication date | 1927 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| Pages | 138 |
| ISBN | NA |
The Bridge of San Luis Rey is a 1927 novel by American author Thornton Wilder that tells the story of several interrelated people who die in the collapse of an Inca rope-fiber suspension bridge in Peru, and the events that lead up to their being on the bridge.[1]. A friar who has witnessed the tragic accident then goes about inquiring into the lives of the victims, seeking some sort of cosmic answer to the question of why each had to die. Philosophically, the book explores the problem of evil, or the question of why unfortunate events occur to people who seem "innocent" or "undeserving". The story makes use of two historical characters, Manuel de Amat y Juniet, who was Viceroy of Peru at the time and his lover, a street singer known as La Perricholi, who, in real life, was named Micaela Villegas. It won the Pulitzer Prize in 1928, and in 1998 it was selected by the editorial board of the American Modern Library as one of the 100 best 20th-Century novels. The book was quoted by Tony Blair during the memorial service for victims of the September 11 attacks in 2001. The book was cited during the 2007 Minneapolis bridge collapse by Brian Williams of NBC News as well as Charlie Gibson of ABC News. This book was cited by John Hersey as a direct inspiration for his nonfiction work Hiroshima (1946).
Contents |
Film adaptations
Three films have been based on the novel:
- The Bridge of San Luis Rey (1929)
- The Bridge of San Luis Rey (1944)
- The Bridge of San Luis Rey (2004)
Popular culture
It is quoted on the cover of British Sea Power's album, The Decline Of British Sea Power. David Mitchell's novel Cloud Atlas echoes it in many ways, most explicitly through the character Luisa Rey.
See also
- List of bridge disasters
- Modern Library 100 Best Novels of the 20th Century
- Photos of the first edition of Bridge of San Luis Rey
References
- ^ John Noble Wilford. "How the Inca Leapt Canyons", The New York Times, 2007-05-08. Retrieved on 2007-05-09.
| Preceded by Early Autumn by Louis Bromfield |
Pulitzer Prize for the Novel 1928 |
Succeeded by Scarlet Sister Mary by Julia Peterkin |
