Author | Harlan Ellison |
---|---|
Language | English |
Publisher | Pyramid Books |
Publication date | 1958 |
Publication place | United States |
Media type | Print (paperback) |
Pages | 190 |
OCLC | 9304637 |
LC Class | CPB Box no. 2970 vol. 20 |
Web of the City (originally published as Rumble) is the first novel written by American author Harlan Ellison. The novel follows the story of Rusty Santoro, a teenage member of the fictional Cougars street gang in the 1950s Brooklyn, New York. In order to research the book, Ellison spent time in an actual street gang in Brooklyn. His book Memos from Purgatory (1961) is a non-fiction account of his time in the Barons.
In 1954, Harlan Ellison – inspired by the juvenile delinquency-themed novels of Hal Ellson [a] [1] [2] – decided to research and write a novel about the teenage street gangs of Brooklyn. Before writing the novel, Ellison became a member of the Brooklyn gang The Barons under an assumed name. The gang's territory was in Red Hook, considered to be one of the most dangerous neighborhoods in Brooklyn. He acted as "war counselor" for the gang for ten weeks before leaving.
After leaving the street gang, Ellison went to Basic Training at Fort Benning, Georgia, to begin his military service. The bulk of the novel was written during his spare time at the camp between mid-1956 and March 1957. In an introduction to the 2013 reprint by Hard Case Crime, [3] Ellison claimed he wrote most of the manuscript in the evening hours while sitting in the toilet with a board on his lap and his portable typewriter atop the board. The book was originally bought by Walter Fultz, an editor at the small independent publishing company Lion Books. The company went out of business before it could publish Web of the City, but Pyramid Books soon bought the rights to Lion's catalog. Pyramid changed the name to Rumble and published it in 1958, while Ellison was a private in the army. The first Ellison knew of the title change was when he received a copy of the book (with other volumes) to review.
The plot revolves around the character of Rusty Santoro, a member of a fictional Brooklyn street gang. In the novel, Santoro is caught between his meager prospects in the neighborhood and obligations to his gang, The Cougars. Throughout the book he struggles with the prospect of leaving his neighborhood and his gang life behind. The novel depicts street fights, murders, and other realities of gang life in urban areas.
In the 1960s American International Pictures announced it was going to make a film version starring Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello. [4]
Harlan Jay Ellison was an American writer, known for his prolific and influential work in New Wave speculative fiction and for his outspoken, combative personality. His published works include more than 1,700 short stories, novellas, screenplays, comic book scripts, teleplays, essays, and a wide range of criticism covering literature, film, television, and print media.
Ralph Waldo Ellison was an American writer, literary critic, and scholar best known for his novel Invisible Man, which won the National Book Award in 1953.
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Invisible Man is Ralph Ellison's first novel, the only one published during his lifetime. It was published by Random House in 1952, and addresses many of the social and intellectual issues faced by African Americans in the early 20th century, including black nationalism, the relationship between black identity and Marxism, and the reformist racial policies of Booker T. Washington, as well as issues of individuality and personal identity.
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Last Exit to Brooklyn is a 1964 novel by American author Hubert Selby Jr. The novel takes a harsh, uncompromising look at lower class Brooklyn in the 1950s written in spare, stripped-down prose.
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Memos from Purgatory is Harlan Ellison's account of his experience with juvenile gangs when he joined one to research them for his first novel, Web of the City. It also describes the author's experience during an overnight stay in jail.
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Rumble Fish is a 1975 novel for young adults by S. E. Hinton, author of The Outsiders. It was adapted to film and directed by Francis Ford Coppola in 1983.
Clarence Budington "Bud" Kelland was an American writer. Prolific and versatile, he was a prominent literary figure in his heyday, and he described himself as "the best second-rate writer in America".
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Harold "Hal" Ellson was an American author of pulp fiction whose work primarily focused on juvenile delinquency, a field in which he has been described as "one of the most popular" writers and as "legendary".
This is a list of works by Harlan Ellison (1934–2018). It includes his literary output, screenplays and teleplays, voiceover work, and other fields of endeavor.
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