The Naked and the Dead (Cyclopedia of Literary Places)
At a glance:
- Author: Norman Mailer
- First Published: 1948
- Type of Work: Novel
- Type of Plot: Social realism
- Time of Work: World War II
- Genres: Long fiction, Social realism
- Subjects: Class conflict, Leadership, World War II, Soldiers, Pacific Ocean
- Locales: Islands, South Pacific, Anopopei (fictive)
Places Discussed
Anopopei. Imaginary island in the South Pacific on which the novel is set. The island’s dense jungle terrain is itself almost a character in the novel—a constant reminder of how primal Nature is when seen in the raw. From the novel’s earliest sections, Mailer uses the jungle to remind readers that this is also true of human beings. One of the foot soldiers thinks that the jungle looks like the Garden of Eden, and there is, in some sense, a parallel. However, this is a post- Fall Eden, not Paradise. Anopopei’s jungle is primal, a force unto itself, and...
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