I was planning to read Tom Wolfe’s „I am Charlotte Simons“ since we mentioned it once in our SUK1 course. A little Southern girl going to Dupont college being corrupted by a frat guy. It sounds interesting, doesn’t it? Actually this book is more than this; I felt absorbed from the very first page and read through 750 pages almost right away.
The storyline concentrates around Charlotte, a very talented high school graduate from a small town Sparta in North Carolina. Charlotte is admitted to one of the most prestigious universities in the country, namely the fictional Dupont University. As she comes from provincial surroundings where religion determines very strongly everyday life and people are poor and behave in a simple, honest way, she experiences a shock when she arrives at Dupont. It strikes her that other students do everything but learn, including partying, sexual activities and just spending money on clothes. At first she concentrates on her academic work, but gradually she becomes lonely and starts looking for some company. In this way she gets acquainted with two other freshman girls and gets to know the “party sides” of the academic life. As Charlotte adjusts to college life, she finds herself dealing with the sexual temptations of it, culminating in her hooking up with Hoyt, a member of the fraternity Saint Ray. There are also other characters like a basketball player Jojo Johanssen, a very average student who takes to improving his academic achievements after meeting Charlotte, and Adam Gellin, a very ambitious and intelligent student, Charlotte’s good friend who fells in love with her and helps her get out of her depression. All in all we encounter everything: love and hate, blackmail and revenge, cheat, popularity aspirations, student’s depression, etc.
Reading Tom Wolfe’s book you can’t get bored. The writer made outstanding research among students of different American universities before writing “I am Charlotte Simons”. That’s why he was able to copy students’ slang, show what is in frat boys’ mind, imagine loser’s thoughts (Adam, Charlotte) and altogether write a story that strikes as so real. Besides, he deserves a Noble Prize for illustrating the Southern accent and black basketball players’ slang.
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