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        The Day Of The Locust


        setting

        Hollywood, California

        time

        1930s

        language

        English

        region

        North America

        year published

        1927

        page count

        126

        difficulty

        Advanced

        main characters

        Homer Simpson, Tod Hackett

        Rip's impressions

        Known as one of the first satires and social commentaries on the creation of Hollywood, the shaper of the American imagination on film. Homer Simpson is the name of one of the sometimes comical, sometimes sad, main characters. Sound familiar?

        first line

        Around quitting time, Tod Hackett heard a great din on the road outside his office. The groan of leather mingled with the jangle of iron and over all beat the tattoo of a thousand hooves. He hurried to the window.

        last lines

        (spoiler alert)

        literary tidbits

        This is where the cartoon character of the same name was born. But I don think he originated here. My theory is that West shaped him out of a character in Sherwood Anderson's Winesburg Ohio; read the chapter on Hands. That character was the truly original Homer Simpson. All American.