The Man In The Gray Flannel Suit (2002) - Plot & Excerpts
Ambientada en la década de los cincuenta, cuando no se hablaba de las frustraciones sino que se ahogaban en martinis, “El hombre del traje gris” de Sloan Wilson se centra en Tom Rath, un hombre que lleva una vida idéntica a la de miles de hombres de aquella época. Tom Rath vive en Connecticut pero cada mañana coge el tren para ir a trabajar a Nueva York. Tom tiene una mujer preciosa que le espera en casa y tres adorables hijos pequeños, pero esto no parece suficiente; en la pared del comedor hay un desconchado en forma de interrogante y las malas hierbas pueblan el jardín. Tom, pero especialmente su mujer (que por algo se pasa el día en casa) odian el vecindario en el que viven, sólo porque sus vecinos son personas como ellos, gente que desea marcharse de este barrio para ir a uno mejor. “El hombre del traje gris” hace una radiografía de la vida en los suburbios durante los años 50 del mismo modo que la hizo John Cheever, pero Sloan Wilson no es tan amargo y pesimista, y en lugar de poner émfasis en las insatisfacciones y la frustración, prefiere centrarse en los esfuerzos que hace el protagonista para conseguir un equilibrio que le permita ser moderadamente feliz. No es que a Tom le guste el dinero, pero sí le gusta lo que se puede hacer con él, por ejemplo pagar en el futuro la universidad a sus tres hijos. Pero Tom tampoco se quiere matar trabajando para su familia, sábados, domingos y vacaciones incluidas, y luego no poder estar nunca con ellos. Tom lucha, como tantos otros, para poder equilibrar vida laboral y vida privada. Pero estos no son los dos únicos mundos que intenta armonizar Tom, también intenta reconciliar pasado y presente, y su traumática experiencia como paracaidista en la segunda guerra mundial con su reintroducción en la vida civil. Se ha acusado muchas veces esta novela de “conformista”, como si este adjetivo tuviera una connotación peyorativa por naturaleza. Tom Wrath a veces es pesimista, casi siempre consciente de sus limitaciones y en ocasiones duda de sus capacidades, pero nunca es un ser pasivo. ¿Qué tiene de malo intentar ser feliz con lo que uno tiene al alcance? Demasiadas veces parece que la literatura debe contar sólo grandes historias de amor, hechos heroicos, vidas rebeldes o cualquier cosa que se salga de la norma, cuando igual de épica puede ser la lucha de un hombre de traje gris que intenta conservar su individualidad en una sociedad que se empeña en anularla, como también lo pueden ser los esfuerzos de un hombre corriente para conservar cierta honestidad y sinceridad (para con los otros pero también consigo mismo) en un entorno hostil. El protagonista desea encontrar lo que los clásicos llamaban “aurea mediocritas”, un término medio que le permita ser feliz, porque sino ¿qué otra opción tiene? ¿Hacerse beatnik y vagabundear por toda Norteamérica? Éste no sería precisamente el estilo de Tom Wrath. El final de “El hombre del traje gris” puede parecer un final feliz al estilo de las películas de Frank Capra, pero como muchas de las películas de Frank Capra si uno se pone a analizar este supuesto final feliz no puede evitar empezar a ver fisuras. Por ejemplo, al final de “¡Qué bello es vivir!” George Bailey descubre que todo el pueblo se ha volcado para ayudarlo porque lo aprecian y, sí, esto está bien, pero no es lo que quería George Bailey en un principio; él quería viajar, descubrir el mundo y sobre todo no quedarse atrapado en Bedford Falls. De modo parecido, puede dar la sensación que Tom Wrath ha conseguido todo lo que quería, pero no se puede evitar pensar que esto no es suficiente y que, si lo ha conseguido, ha sido más que nada por un golpe de suerte y que, como en las numerosas ocasiones anteriores en las que todo parecía ir viento en popa, las cosas se volverán a torcer en el momento menos pensado. “El hombre del traje gris” es una obra en la que, por más que nunca se miren de frente, los sinsabores de la vida siempre están ahí escondidos, a punto de salir a la superficie en forma de jarrón estampado contra la pared. La novela se termina, pero uno tiene la sensación que la lucha por conseguir el equilibrio de Tom Wrath no se acabará jamás; las dificultades y las pequeñas frustraciones durarán toda la vida. Se podría decir que la lectura de John Cheever deja un sabor amargo, mientras que la de Sloan Wilson deja una sensación agridulce.
Whenever I watch The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit with Gregory Peck, I say, "Boy, it'd be nice to read the original novel by Sloan Wilson sometime, wouldn't it?"...and when I at last came across an old 1956 printing in the local library basement sale, this old paperback shouldered its way immediately to the top of my reading list. I was not disappointed. It is an enjoyable and moving five-star work.The basics of the novel--a combat veteran haunted by memories of the men he killed, and by the brief, desperate love he found in Italy, tries to turn his mousy career and his dispirited marriage around by joining the "rat race"--are familiar to anyone who has seen the film, so there is little need to cover them here. The novel, of course, is more finely grained in its telling detail than any film, and such detail is lifelike and good, and ultimately moving.On the one hand, Wilson's narrative voice can be urbane and gently wry. After spending most of the first page describing a question-mark-shaped crack in the wall of the couple's dingy house, for example, the text reports with calm irony that this suspicious shape "d[oes] not seem symbolic to Tom and Betty, nor even amusing"--and in case we still don't get it, another nudge points out that everyone else cannot help staring at the thing. Sentences of the offhand "It was fashionable that summer to be cynical about one's employers..." variety are a similar joy.Coupled with such minor authorial games, however, is a rich investigation of the mind of ex-paratrooper and now vaguely wary husband Tom Rath. During the Second World War, in close combat, Rath killed seventeen men--a fact "he simply hadn't thought about for quite a few years" rather than "a thing he had deliberately tried to forget." Mm hmm. And yet, as he thinks of those years, "His mind [goes] blank. Suddenly the word 'Maria' flashe[s] into it"...and yet, at least this early on, all we will get is that single word, and then the narrative tacks intriguingly away.Wilson will give more in due time, of course. He will show us Rath's bleak fatalism of December '44, when after two years of fighting in Europe his unit is to be sent to the Pacific, and he knows--knows--that his luck will run out, and in another jump, or two at the most, he will be dead. The future he will never see, the cold beer he will never drink, the rare steaks he will never eat, the lovely wife waiting at home, to whom he will never make love again--they do not seem real, while only the vulnerable and passionate Maria makes life at all palatable. And of course, just before shipping out to the Pacific Theater, he learns that there may be a child...The friend killed by Rath's grenade, the unacknowledged longing for Maria and his abandoned child, his own absent father shell-shocked in the First World War and then likely suicided in the '20s, the ancient grandmother with her tales of family glory, the faithful wife who wants to see him happy and successful--the introspective Tom Rath is pushed and pulled by impetuses he struggles to understand. And if he is to start living again, truly living, he will have to face the truth, as he has been avoiding for so long.Is the ending a little too pat? Perhaps. Certainly Betty Rath, after a revelation that could indeed finish many a marriage, ends up being an astoundingly good sport about it. Would Tom be as forgiving, one might wonder, if Betty, as convinced as he had been of his imminent death, had found comfort as he did in Rome? Maybe at this stage of the novel he might. Wilson does not quite raise the question, however--unfortunate, as even a few lines would be worthwhile.Nevertheless, the conclusion may indeed be believable. Betty Rath, after all, begins to realize that she has never had a clue about even a tenth of what the man sleeping beside her all these years has suffered, and her sympathy is touching, as are her husband's final simple and heartfelt, almost awestruck professions of love. Tom Rath in the end has nothing to hide, and for the first time in years he feels not cynical and bitter but happy, within himself and within his marriage. After delving so believably into the mind of a privileged college boy turned killer, then turned corporate drone, and finally turned balanced human being, Sloan Wilson brings The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit to a conclusion that is life-affirming and even heartwarming.
What do You think about The Man In The Gray Flannel Suit (2002)?
I really debated on whether to give this one 3 stars or 4 and I decided on 4 because I enjoyed the story and characters a great deal, and I still found myself thinking about the story after I finished the book. The real problem with this book is the writing quality. It's full of passive sentences and the author loves to say had had. For instance he might say something like, "I took the children to the park after they had had their dinner." (I made that up, it's not taken from the book) He does this a lot, nearly every page. Certainly the sentence has the same meaning with only one "had"! I will say that the writing improved as the novel went on, I think this is because there were more characters and dialogue. I really did enjoy the story though, the characters were interesting, and it had a very satisfying ending.
—Dustin
I picked up The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit with the understanding that it inspired the popular television show Mad Men. In reading the book the similarities are readily apparent. Both deal with the white collar corporate environment of the late 1950's, early 1960's. The leads in both are war time veterans attempting to find where they fit in, balancing their New York careers with their suburban home life and struggling with their duty to their wives and the torch they still carry in their heart for another. The lead character is Tom Rath, a former World War II paratrooper, working a corporate job and slogging along in the pursuit of happiness. His wife Betsy dreams of moving up in the world and encourages Tom to try for a potentially lucrative job as a public relations professional in a major television network. Tom lands the job and has an opportunity for real advancement as the right hand man of network head Ralph Hopkins. Hopkins is consumed with work at the expense of his family life and Tom has to decide if he is willing to make the same sacrifice. The main story is interesting enough but the subplots were pretty flat and unnecessary, such as Tom's legal attempt to obtain an inherited home versus a rival claimant. Where this book is most compelling is when it deals with the brutality of wartime. Tom fights the inner demons that come from the death of his friends and the enemies he killed with his own hands. There is a very moving passage in the book where Tom attempts to rationalize the lunacy of wartime with his post war life. It begins with, "they ought to begin wars with a course in basic training and end them with a course in basic forgetting." So true.The writing in this novel is serviceable to the story, neither good or bad. I wasn't wowed by the plot of the the Gray Flannel Suit. It often seemed to drag, such as when it dealt with Tom's constant attempt to rewrite a speech for Hopkins. As a whole, The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit, is an authentic capsule of the mentality of the time and I suppose worth reading for that, especially for those interested in the era.
—Anthony Mathenia
This was a fun, quick read. I liked its darkly sarcastic humor that reminded me a bit of the style of Catch 22. Anyone who has struggled with a job they are not happy with in order to make ends meet can relate to this novel in some way. In the introduction, Jonathan Franzen says the first half is better than the second half, and he's right, but I did enjoy the book all the way through. The book's biggest problem is that the ending is ridiculous and completely unsatisfying. But for me that was not a deal breaker. ~It's about the journey not the destination~. Sloan Wilson, the author, admits in the afterword that this book ain't exactly War and Peace, but not everything has to be. I would recommend this novel if ya want a good dose of 50s Americana.
—Wes Townsend
