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Wednesday, August 25, 2010

"Squeal like a pig": The anniversary 

Forty years have passed since James Dickey wrote Deliverance, an important novel I have never read but will now that I have thought of it. Anywho, the New York Times has a nice story marking the anniversary of the book, including some trenchant observations about the state of men in literature today and the history of the famous "squeal like a pig" line from the movie. A lunch time enrichment opportunity, perhaps.


6 Comments:

By Blogger pam, at Wed Aug 25, 02:35:00 PM:

Despite its "that" line, it's a wonderful, wonderful read. SO well written....  

By Anonymous Anonymous, at Wed Aug 25, 04:14:00 PM:

Do you remember the book "Primary Colors" by Joe Klein? It was a thinly-disguised story of the Clinton candidacy. In the book, Klein describes the James Carville character as looking like he was conceived during the "love scene in Deliverance."  

By Blogger Escort81, at Wed Aug 25, 07:16:00 PM:

Great book, better than the movie, as is usually the case, although I read the book after seeing the movie.

That squeal scene was "rape-rape," to borrow Whoopi's terminology (she stated that in the Roman Polanski matter, it wasn't "rape-rape," since the teenaged girl did not resist physically after being plied with drugs and alcohol), although when my father took me to see the movie when I was 12 or 13 in 1972, I had a limited idea of what was going on there.

The hand that came up out of the water at the very end -- sorry, spoiler alert! -- really freaked me out.  

By Blogger pam, at Wed Aug 25, 11:14:00 PM:

I think I was 12-13 when I happened upon the book. When I re-read it later, mid 30s, I loved it so much more!

Whoopi is a buffoon. But, there was definitely resistance in Deliverance...  

By Blogger Christopher Dickey, at Sat Aug 28, 04:10:00 AM:

Thanks for posting this item on the NYT article, which all of us in the Dickey family deeply appreciated. It's great to see people discussing the book, for a change, instead of the movie. If you’d like to learn more about James Dickey, you might want to follow “Deep Deliverance” and look at some of the related links: http://jamesdickey.blogspot.com/
All the best, Christopher, Kevin and Bronwen  

By Blogger pam, at Sat Aug 28, 01:53:00 PM:

Christopher--I love his poetry, too. Neat you read this thread here....  

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