Aurora Dawn

Herman Wouk

Jun 2009 · Sold by Back Bay Books

About this ebook

The publication of 'Aurora Dawn' in 1947 immediately established Herman Wouk as a novelist of exceptional literary and historical significance. Today, Aurora Dawn's themes have grown still more relevant and, in the manner of all great fiction, its characters and ironies have only been sharpened by the passage of time. Wouk's raucous satire of Manhattan's high-power elite recounts the adventures of one Andrew Reale as he struggles toward fame and fortune in the early days of radio. On the quest for wealth and prestige, ambitious young Andrew finds himself face-to-face with his own devil's bargain: forced to choose between soul and salary, true love and a strategic romance, Wouk's riotous, endearing hero learns a timeless lesson about the high cost of success in America's most extravagant metropolis.

About the author

Herman Wouk was born in the Bronx, New York on May 27, 1915. He received a bachelor's degree in comparative literature and philosophy from Columbia University. In 1936, he became a staff writer for the radio comedian Fred Allen. He enlisted in the Navy immediately after Pearl Harbor and was posted as a radio officer in the South Pacific. His debut novel, Aurora Dawn, was published in 1947. His other novels included The City Boy, Marjorie Morningstar, Youngblood Hawke, Don't Stop the Carnival, The Winds of War, War and Remembrance, The Hope, The Gift, A Hole in Texas, and The Lawgiver. He received the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 1952 for The Caine Mutiny. He received the first Library of Congress Lifetime Achievement Award for the Writing of Fiction in 2008. His nonfiction books included This Is My God, The Language God Talks, and Sailor and Fiddler: Reflections of a 100-Year-Old Author. Several of his books were adapted into movies including The Caine Mutiny and Marjorie Morningstar. He adapted the courtroom sections of The Caine Mutiny into the Broadway play The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial. His other Broadway shows included The Traitor and Nature's Way. He died on May 17, 2019 at the age of 103.