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Nathanael West describes a part of Hollywood few of us ever see. F Scott Fitzgerald says of Day of the Locust, it has scenes of extraordinary power. Especially I was impressed by the pathological crowd at the premiere, the character and handling of the aspirant actress and the uncanny medieval feeling of some of the Hollywood background set off by those vividly drawn grotesque. (Qtd. On backcover of The Day of the Locust. New Directions 1969) We see West’s Hollywood through the eyes of Tod Hackett an aspiring set designer, and the characters, extras, technicians, old stage performers, he encounters. Hackett sees a Hollywood much different than the one of his visions. It is not the land of opportunity he expected to find. Instead he finds drug addiction, sexual perversion, and crime. The story takes place during depression era Los Angeles.
On page 128 of the Signet Classic Edition of The Day of the Locust, Nathanael West describes the piles of sets, flats and props abandoned in the center of a field behind the movie studio.
This was the final dumping ground. He [Tod Hackett] thought of Janvier's "Sargasso Sea." Just as that imaginary body of water was a history of civilization in the form of a marine junkyard, the studio lit was one in the form of a dream dump. A Sargasso of the imagination! And the dump grew continually, for there was not a dream afloat somewhere which would not sooner or later turn up on it, having first been made photographic by plaster, canvas, lath and paint. Many boats sink and never reach the Sargasso, but no dream ever entirely disappears. Somewhere it troubles some unfortunate person and some day, when that person has been sufficiently troubled, it will be reproduced on the lot. (P. 128)
This narrative piece of Tod’s consciousness also describes the people in the novel. The dump—Hollywood—grows continually “for there was not a dream afloat somewhere which would not sooner or later turn up on it.” The dreams of the imaginations of the people who came to Hollywood seeking fame only to find sleaze. Like the boats, many people sink, and their dreams never come true, but no dream ever completely disappears. It can be found in reincarnated in small towns throughout the country and when a person becomes haunted enough by their dreams of success in Hollywood, the original failed dream is reproduced. The people change, but the dreams they all remain the same.
West tells the story of characters on the fringe of the entertainment industry, Homer Simpson, Faye Greener, and Tod Hackett. The story is terse and biting. Each character has come to California seeking fame or health in the shining city, and each carries his own history of bitterness and dreams. The imagery West uses to illustrate the moral decay of this fringe population is sometimes disturbing, sometimes inspired, and occasionally presages events still decades into the future for Los Angeles.
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