Word: hoaglands
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...Edward Hoagland '55 published his first book, "Cat Man," last week and the current issue of Time describes it as "a flashing and inspired job of observation...
...Edward Hoagland-Houghton Mifflin...
Reading this novel about circus life is a little like lifting a splendid rug and finding that unspeakable things have been swept under it. In this case the sweepings are human beings. Author Hoagland, a young Harvardman now serving in the Army, has written a first novel that falls far short of real consequence, but is alive with very real people and very real animals. It makes the circus world itself as startling and brutal as the sudden roar of a lion at five yards...
...Author Hoagland does not deal with the gay and colorful spectacle that can be observed by the dazzled ticketholders. His hero is a young alcoholic who has hit the end of the trail, takes a job helping to feed and look after the "cats"-the lions, tigers and leopards. From the first he is called "Fiddler," because it has been so long since he had the price of a haircut. Down-and-outer that he is, he still has enough fundamental decency in him to be shocked by the human derelicts who do most of the work of the circus...
...weakness of Cat Man is the glancing, one-dimensional approach to its characters: perhaps Author Hoagland understands the cats better than the men. But his book is a flashing, at times inspired job of observation. Few who read it will ever have quite the same old romantic about the circus. But what is remarkable about Hoagland's hard look is that the circus seems more fascinating than it ever did from the grandstand. Hoagland, who has himself worked at jobs like Fiddler's during summer vacations, gets off a series of brilliant set pieces: the big top going...