The Boy Orator - Hardcover

Daugherty, Tracy

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 087074433X ISBN 13: 9780870744334

Publisher: Southern Methodist Univ Pr, 1999

Synopsis

A novel on the socialist movement in Oklahoma at the turn of the century. The hero is Harry Shaughnessy, 11, trained by his father to address meetings in halls because a boy is a crowd-drawer and can say things without provoking the wrath of mine owners.The novel looks at the exploitation of patriotism to destroy the movement around World War I. By the author of What Falls Away.Harry Shaughnessy, the young son of an Oklahoma farmer, uses his loud speaking voice to talk about his father's socialist beliefs to groups of farmers, miners, and oil workers, where he meets Eugene V. Debs and other influential socialists

About this title

About the Author

Tracy Daugherty is an associate professor of English at Oregon State University.

Reviews

The orator of this detailed historical novel is Harry Shaughnessy, a boy born in Texas just before the turn of the century. Harry's father, Andrew, grooms his son to be an orator and apostle for the coming new age of socialism. By the time Harry is 12, he's traveling far from home, speaking out against the evils of capitalism. Daugherty (What Falls Away) draws from the true-life experiences of his grandfather in creating Harry, and the strengths of the novel rest firmly in the richly evoked prairies and small towns of Oklahoma. Harry watches the flight of "salmon-colored scissortails," sees "the white blossoms of Chickasaw plums" and smells "the woody smell of bluestem mixed with the scent of his mother's lemon meringue." Even after Harry and his father are beaten by Klansmen in the town of Anadarko, Harry embarks on a speaking tour, meeting some of the most well-known socialists of the day, including Eugene V. Debs and Oscar Ameringer. The First World War effectively halts a large-scale socialist movement, as patriotic fervor sweeps the country and all of Harry's old heroes are silenced or put behind bars. Daugherty skillfully weaves history into his presentation of the early 20th century's dramatic political landscape. Infusing his characters with the same compelling energy and revolutionary spirit proves more difficult, however: readers may interpret young Harry's commitment to socialism as a pliant child's obedience to his father's politics. When Harry grows into an idealistic young man, his virtuous stance is admirable, but ultimately the robust descriptions of race relations and early resistance movements are Daugherty's triumph. (Mar.) FYI: Daugherty's work has garnered an NEA grant, an Associated Writing Program Award in the Novel, an Oregon Book Award and a Southwestern Booksellers' Award.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Novelist Daugherty (What Falls Away, 1996) takes us back to turn-of-the-century Oklahoma for a historical morality play about power and the creation of new societies. In later years, Harry Shaughnessy would have been called a Red-diaper baby. Although his pious mother Annie Mae was too Catholic to have much in the way of political convictions, his father Andrew became a Socialist and a labor organizer at an early age and raised his boy to believe more devoutly in the coming Triumph of the Working Man than most children believe in Santa Claus. So effective was Andrews influence on young Harry, in fact, that before he was even ten the boy became an accomplished orator, addressing socialist conventions and meeting-halls from one end of Oklahoma to other. A child at the podium was a good draw, as Andrew Shaughnessy knewthe novelty would supply the audience, and a boy could get away with saying more than the police and the mine owners would allow from a grown man. For decades, Oklahoma had been run by the mines more or less as one big company town, and now that statehood had been achieved, the authorities were tightening the screws even further. Like his heroes Eugene Debs and Big Bill Haywood, young Harry set out to let the man in the street know when he was getting the short end of the stick. But, like Debs, he underestimated the power of patriotism, eventually finding himself facing prison for refusing to serve in WWI. A good-hearted local politician tries to give Harry some advice: The States changing, kid. Modernizing . . . Socialism has reached the end of its trail. But Harrys a true believer and, like all saints, destined for martyrdom. By the time it comes, its not much of a surprise. Hokey and pious, written with all the depth of a catechism and all the color of a tract. -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Edition details

• Publisher: Southern Methodist Univ Pr
• Publication date: 1999
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 087074433X
• ISBN 13: 9780870744334
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 249