A Review of 'The Second Coming' by Walker Percy

"Will Barrett, a lonely widower, suffers from a depression so strange and severe that he decides he doesn't want to continue living.  But then he meets Allison, a mental hospital escapee making a new life for herself, living along in a greenhouse.  What follows is by turns touching and zany, tragic and comic, as Will goes in search of proof of God and winds up finding much more."

This was one of my favorites that we read in Philosophic Themes in Literature class.  Once more, we are dealing with attitudes towards life, but if you've read The Plague and/or Nausea, this view of the world is somewhere in between.  We are randomly given life and we're pretty insignificant, but that doesn't mean that we can't matter or make others feel like they matter to us.  It's a nice happy-medium view of the world and that makes me feel very comfortable.

As my class and I read this, we all agreed that Ally's chapters were better than Will's.  Not that we could relate directly to her, but we were right there with her as she rediscovers the world around her after experiencing several rounds of electroshock therapy.  It was also really nice because she lived so simply, getting only the necessities (food, water, heat), and simply joys to pass the time when needed (books).  I loved reading about this, especially since Will was busy surrounding himself with things that he thought he needed and they didn't even turn out to be needs of his, much less wants.

For class, we also read articles about Walker Percy and I found the writing that appears in his novels to be much more accessible than those articles.  Reading books and learning lessons is a lot easier when reading about them in novel form rather than in article form.

I definitely want to try reading more Walker Percy novels.

I give 'The Second Coming':

Thanks for Reading!

--Jude