Pulitzer Book Club Inclusion Guide
"The Bridge of San Luis Rey"
by Thorton Wilder
INCLUSION MILESTONES
1928
• Virginia sterilization law challenged; Supremes ruling to affirm still not overturned
• Bootleggers' income taxed
• 78 recordings of Louis Armstrong's West End Blues
AUTHOR INSPIRATIONS
Well-traveled, multi-lingual Wilder had never been to Peru or spoken Spanish until well after he wrote the novel. He showed his sister a small bridge on the Princeton campus where the idea for the book came to him, full blown. Wilder was inspired by Posper Merimee’s play about the affair between Viceroy of Peru and famous actress La Perichole and philosophical arguments with his Calvinist father.
GET THE BOOK
Featured Reader Wanted!
Featured Reader
– Share your key take-away about inclusion in this book in a sentence or two.
– Write a paragraph or two (up to 250 words) to describe your thoughts on exclusion/inclusion in the book, why you related or did not connect with the book, and why you think reading, inclusion and dialog about inclusion matter.
– Identify the name and website address of a cause you support with an inclusive mission.
Why did those five people die when Peruvian bridge collapsed?
Friar philosopher burned along with his book.
Progenitor of disaster epic. Humanizes random tragedy via five victim backstories.
Short, profound 138 pages, 4 hours
There is no explanation for why one person experiences tragedy instead of another person.
Religious philosopher questions the purpose of destiny and suffering and divine intervention.
Positive and negative attributes and mysteries of five diverse victims and people in their lives explored.
Philosophical concepts presented in the novel set in Peru: fate is random; decisions can determine destiny, the universal implications of love and death, there never can be two who love each other equally well and meaning is found in connections with others, not in individual meaning.
Go virtuous and serve Peruvian soup or porridge. Avoid temptation to throw a theatrical after party suitable for celebs featuring food that encourages gout. Debate genetic and food destinies.
“There is a land of the living and a land of the dead and the bridge is love, the only survival, the only meaning.”
Somewhere with a view of a bridge and/or anxiety-producing precipitous drop.
Does this novel feel universal? Current? Why/why not?
Is this book cultural appropriation or appreciation?
How does the setting and time of the novel affect the novel’s message?
Compare the people in the novel through the eyes of a higher power.
How did the community respond to the bridge collapse? What happens to communities today where a tragedy occurs? What does it take to prevent a similar future disaster?
Why is disaster a compelling topic for novels, movies, and politics?
Are people marginalized because of a belief that divine displeasure causes bad things to happen?
Is acceptance that sometimes bad stuff just happens a way to support sufferers and embrace equality? Is there another more empathetic viewpoint?
If you can’t make it to an abyss in the Peruvian Andes, go to a memorial disaster site. Sadly, there are many options, including 9-11 memorials, sites of school shootings, places where police brutality occurred, and FEMA disaster areas. Think about people who lost their lives and why it happened to them instead of you or someone else.
If you want to go on a Thornton Wilder quest, see one of his plays, ideally at Princeton’s McCarter Theatre. There are Wilder collections at Princeton as well as at nearby Lawrenceville School where Wilder was a French teacher and house master.
Film adaptations in 1929, 1944 and 2004.
Only writer to win Pulitzers for both fiction and drama (for the plays Our Town in 1938 and The Skin of Our Teeth in 1942).
Other novels include The Cabala (1926), Woman of Andros (1930), The Ides of March (1948), The Eighth Day (1967), and Theophilus North (1973).