A Home at the End of the World: A Novel

by Michael Cunningham

Overview

From Michael Cunningham, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Hours, comes the acclaimed novel of two boyhood friends A Home at the End of the World, now a feature film starring Colin Farrell and Dallas Roberts Jonathan.

There's Jonathan, lonely, introspective, and unsure of himself; and Bobby, hip, dark, and inarticulate. In New York after college, Bobby moves in with Jonathan and his roommate, Clare, a veteran of the city's erotic wars. Bobby and Clare fall in love, scuttling the plans of Jonathan, who is gay, to father Clare's child. Then, when Clare and Bobby have a baby, the three move to a small house upstate to raise "their" child together and, with an odd friend, Alice, create a new kind of family.

A Home at the End of the World masterfully depicts the charged, fragile relationships of urban life today.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780312202316
Publisher:	Picador
Publication date:	11/15/1998
Edition description:	First Edition
Pages:	352
Sales rank:	431,805
Product dimensions:	7.60(w) x 8.20(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

MICHAEL CUNNINGHAM is the author of the novels A Home at the End of the World, Flesh and Blood, Specimen Days, By Nightfall, and The Snow Queen, as well as the collection A Wild Swan and Other Tales, and the nonfiction book Land’s End: A Walk in Provincetown. He is the recipient of a Whiting Award and a Guggenheim Fellowship, and his work has appeared in The New Yorker and The Best American Short Stories. The Hours was a New York Times bestseller, and the winner of both the PEN/Faulkner Award and the Pulitzer Prize. Raised in Los Angeles, Michael Cunningham lives in New York City, and is a senior lecturer at Yale University.

Hometown:

New York, New York

Date of Birth:

November 6, 1952

Place of Birth:

Cincinnati, Ohio

Education:

B.A., Stanford University, 1975; M.F.A., University of Iowa, 1980

Website:

http://www.michaelcunninghamwriter.com

Read an Excerpt

BOBBY

Once our father bought a convertible. Don't ask me. I was five. He bought it and drove it home as casually as he'd bring a gallon of rocky road. Picture our mother's surprise. She kept rubber bands on the doorknobs. She washed old plastic bags and hung them on the line to dry, a string of thrifty tame jellyfish floating in the sun. Imagine her scrubbing the cheese smell out of a plastic bag on its third or fourth go-round when our father pulls up in a Chevy convertible, used but nevertheless -- a moving metal landscape, chrome bumpers and what looks like acres of molded silver car-flesh. He saw it parked downtown with a For Sale sign and decided to be the kind of man who buys a car on a whim. We can see as he pulls up that the manic joy has started to fade for him. The car is already an embarrassment. He cruises into the driveway with a frozen smile that matches the Chevy's grille.

Of course the car has to go. Our mother never sets foot. My older brother Carlton and I get taken for one drive. Carlton is ecstatic. I am skeptical. If our father would buy a car on a street corner, what else might he do? Who does this make him?

He takes us to the country. Roadside stands overflow with apples. Pumpkins shed their light on farmhouse lawns. Carlton, wild with excitement, stands up on the front seat and has to be pulled back down. I help. Our father grabs Carlton's beaded cowboy belt on one side and I on the other. I enjoy this. I feel useful, helping to pull Carlton down.

We pass a big farm. Its outbuildings are anchored on a sea of swaying wheat, its white clapboard is molten in the late, hazy light. All three of us, even Carlton, keep quiet as we pass. There is something familiar about this place. Cows graze, autumn trees cast their long shade. I tell myself we are farmers, and also somehow rich enough to drive a convertible. The world is gaudy with possibilities. When I ride in a car at night, I believe the moon is following me.

"We're home," I shout as we pass the farm. I don't know what I am saying. It's the combined effects of wind and speed on my brain. But neither Carlton nor our father questions me. We pass through a living silence. I am certain at that moment that we share the same dream. I look up to see that the moon, white and socketed in a gas-blue sky, is in fact following us. It isn't long before Carlton is standing up again, screaming into the rush of air, and our father and I are pulling him down, back into the sanctuary of that big car.

 

JONATHAN

We gathered at dusk on the darkening green. I was five. The air smelled of newly cut grass, and the sand traps were luminous. My father carried me on his shoulders. I was both pilot and captive of his enormity. My bare legs thrilled to the sandpaper of his cheeks, and I held on to his ears, great soft shells that buzzed minutely with hair.

My mother's red lipstick and fingernails looked black in the dusk. She was pregnant, just beginning to show, and the crowd parted for her. We made our small camp on the second fairway, with two folding aluminum chairs. Multitudes had turned out for the celebration. Smoke from their portable barbecues sharpened the air. I settled myself on my father's lap, and was given a sip of beer. My mother sat fanning herself with the Sunday funnies. Mosquitoes circled above us in the violet ether.

That Fourth of July the city of Cleveland had hired two famous Mexican brothers to set off fireworks over the municipal golf course. These brothers put on shows all over the world, at state and religious affairs. They came from deep in Mexico, where bread was baked in the shape of skulls and virgins, and fireworks were considered to be man's highest form of artistic expression.

The show started before the first star announced itself. It began unspectacularly. The brothers were playing their audience, throwing out some easy ones: standard double and triple blossomings, spiral rockets, colored sprays that left drab orchids of colored smoke Ordinary stuff. Then, following a pause, they began in earnest. A rocket shot straight up, pulling a thread of sliver light in its wake, and at the top of its arc it bloomed purple, a blazing five-pronged lily, each petal of which burst out with a blossom of its own. The crowd cooed its appreciation. My father cupped my belly with one enormous brown hand, and asked if I was enjoying the show. I nodded. Below his throat, an outcropping of dark blond hairs struggled to escape the collar of his madras shirt.

More of the lilies exploded, red yellow and mauve, their sliver stem lingering beneath them. Then came the snakes, hissing orange fire, a dozen at a time, great lolloping curves that met, intertwined, and diverged, sizzling all the while. They were followed by huge soundless snowflakes, crystalline bodies of purest white, and those by a constellation in the shape of Miss Liberty, with blue eyes and ruby lips. Thousands gasped and applauded. I remember my father's throat, speckled with dried blood, the stubbly skin loosely covering a huge knobbed mechanism that swallowed beer. When I whimpered at the occasional loud bang, or at a scattering of colored embers that seemed to be dropping directly onto our heads, he assured me we had nothing to fear. I could feel the rumble of his voice in my stomach and my legs. His lean arms, each lazily bisected by a single vein, held me firmly in place.

Reading Group Guide

Before the phenomenal success of his Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Hours, Michael Cunningham published A Home at the End of the World to critical acclaim. It's the boldly affecting story of a love triangle between two men and a woman: Jonathan, headstrong and lonely; Bobby, dreamy and vulnerable; Clara, charismatic and adventurous. Challenging conventional notions of family and sexuality, the story spans four decades, reflecting many of the cultural changes and contradictions of America itself. In many ways more relevant than when it first appeared, A Home at the End of the World is an unflinching re-examination of the definition of family and gender roles, determined to explore unanswered questions raised by Sixties and Seventies counter—culture that dog us to this day.

1. Discuss the significance of the title A Home at the End of the World. Does it suggest hope, despair, or both? Explain.

2. Consider the structure of the novel. Why do alternating narrators work for this particular story? How would the story differ if an omniscient narrator or only one character told it? Is there one narrator whose voice you found especially compelling or identified with most? Why?

3. If you've read The Hours or Flesh and Blood by Michael Cunningham, what similarities do you notice in Cunningham's narrative style or themes with A Home at the End of the World? What distinguishes this book from his two later novels?

4. The third chapter was an award-winning short story, entitled "White Angel," published in The New Yorker prior to the novel. What makes that chapter particularly effective as a separate story? How does the rest of the novel deepen and expand on that story?

5. On page 6, Jonathan mentions his father's "beauty." Do you agree with him that it is unusual to speak of a father in that way? Why? Is male beauty or behavior portrayed in similarly unexpected or surprising ways in the novel?

6. As a young mother, Alice says of her relationship with her son Jonathan and his best friend Bobby: "Sometimes in those days I thought of Wendy from Peter Pan—an island mother to a troop of lost boys" (p. 87). What do you think she means? How does the theme of "lost boys" figure into the novel as a whole? What role do the women play in relation to this theme?

7. Discuss the eroticism fueling Jonathan and Bobby's childhood friendship. Do you think they view their shared sexual experiences differently? Explain. How does the erotic component of their relationship change as the novel progresses? Is there anything that remains constant?

8. On page 179, Jonathan says, "We become the stories we tell about ourselves." How might this observation apply to Jonathan, Bobby, Clare, and Alice? Do you view the stories these characters tell themselves as a form of self-preservation, self-delusion, or both? Explain with specific examples.

9. Do you think Jonathan, Bobby and Clare's attempt to redefine family succeeded or failed? Why? What do you think defines a family? What do you think the novel is ultimately saying about family?

10. What role does Erich play in the character's lives? In what ways do you think he is a catalyst for change? Discuss the significance of death in the novel.

11. In Bobby's final chapter, he thinks he spots a vision of Clare. "What I saw was just the wind blowing," he realizes. "It was either the wind or the spirit of the house itself, briefly unsettled by our nocturnal absence but to old to be sur prised by the errands born from the gap between what we can imagine and what we can in fact create" (p. 336). What do you think he means? Discuss the significance of this statement to the story as a whole.

Editorial Reviews

Lyrical . . . Memorable and accomplished.” —The New York Times Book Review

“Novels don't come more deeply felt than Cunningham's extraordinary four-character study . . . The writing [is] a constant pleasure, flowing and yet dense with incisive images and psychological nuance.” —Matthew Gilbert, The Boston Globe

“The story of Jonathan, Clare, Bobby, and Alice is also the story of the 70's and 80's in America—and vice versa. It is destined to last.” —David Leavitt, author of The Marble Quilt

“Cunningham has written a novel that all but reads itself.” —The Washington Post Book World

“Once in a great while, there appears a novel so spellbinding in its beauty and sensitivity that the reader devours it nearly whole, in great greedy gulps, and feels stretched sore afterwards, having been expanded and filled. Such a book is [this one].” —Sherry Rosenthal, San Diego Tribune

“Luminous with the wonders and anxieties that make childhood mysterious . . . A Home at the End of the World is a remarkable accomplishment.” —Laura Frost, San Francisco Review

“Brilliant and satisfying . . . As good as anything I've read in years . . . Hope in the midst of tragedy is a fragile thing, and Cunningham carries it with masterful care.” —Gayle Kidder, San Diego Union

“Exquisitely written . . . Lyrical . . . An important book.” —Charleston Sunday News and Courier

“Cunningham writes with power and delicacy . . . We come to feel that we know Jonathan, Bobby, and Clare as if we lived with them; yet each one retains the mystery that in people is called soul, and in fiction is called art.” —Richard Eder, The Los Angeles Times

From the Publisher

Two very different boys are drawn together by their oppressive home lives and by a connection that is both brotherly and sexual in this superb audio adaptation of Cunningham's vivid coming-of-age tale. Clevelanders Bobby Morrow and Jonathan Glover become childhood friends in the 1960s, and their friendship persists well into the '80s, when first Jonathan and then Bobby moves to New York City. There they meet aging hippie Clare, who imposes her own needs upon the two men. Clare, read with unflappable clarity by Van Dyck, attempts to build a normal life for herself using Bobby to become pregnant and Jonathan as emotional support. But as Jonathan's perceptive mother, Alice, warns her son, the unusual family they're creating won't last. Actors Farrell and Roberts who play Bobby and Jonathan respectively in the Warner Brothers motion picture fill the same roles here, and both deliver moving, understated performances. Although some listeners will wish they could soak up this absorbing story all in one sitting, the narrators' well-paced readings force the listener to sit back and appreciate the intricacy and skill of Cunningham's exquisite prose. Based on the FSG hardcover. (July) Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Publishers Weekly

This poignant and absorbing novel, parts of which have already appeared in the New Yorker , is one of a kind: at once a bildungsroman that reveals a remarkable gay sensibility, a serious appraisal of how parents and children relate over the years, and a clear-eyed account of '80s ways of looking and living.

It is the story of two young Clevelanders, Jonathan and Bobby, who become boyhood friends in spite of, and partly because of, their unhappily adjusted parents. They eventually emigrate to New York, where they end up living together -- and with a superbly realized eccentric, Clare, a very hip but desperate woman who tries to relate to them both, ends up having Bobby's child, attempts to share life in the country with them and eventually drifts away. Other characters rendered in detail include Jonathan's mother, Alice, a firm-minded survivor; her ever-optimistic husband, Ned; and Jonathan's sometime lover Erich, who comes to agonizing life for the reader only as he is dying of AIDS.

No praise can be too high for Cunningham's writing. He worked six years on the novel, and it shows in the careful way he evokes fleeting thoughts and states of consciousness, in the lyrical sense of the ordinariness of place, whether Cleveland, New York, Arizona or upstate New York, in the musical background that accompanies much of the action, almost as in a movie, and in the unexpected ways that characters who have not met before interrelate when they do. His story is told from several alternating points of view -- Jonathan's, Bobby's, Clare's and Alice's -- and though this works well in narrative terms, the voices are not as different as one would expect from such fully realized characters. And some scenes, like the birth of Clare's baby, are unaccountably missing.

Still, this is a gripping, haunting piece of work from a writer of real promise and power.

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

Cunningham's novel focuses on the close friendship of Bobby and Jonathan. As boyhood friends growing up in Cleveland in the late Sixties and Seventies, Bobby and Jonathan form a relationship that is both average and far beyond what most kids would consider "normal.'' After high school Jonathan moves to New York City, where Bobby soon follows. They become involved with Clare, a slightly older woman who finds each one appealing in his own way. The rest of the novel centers on their unusual life together. This well-written book has lots of good dialog and will appeal to readers who want something other than the tried and true best seller.
-- Mary K. Prokop, CEL Regional Library, Savannah, Georgia

Library Journal

Cunningham writes with power and delicacy.... We come to feel that we know Jonathan, Bobby, and Clare as if we lived with them; yet each one retains the mystery that in people is called soul, and in fiction is called art.
-- The Los Angeles Times

Eder

Novels don't come more deeply felt than Michael Cunningham's extraordinary four-character study... The writing...is a constant pleasure, flowing and yet dense with incisive images and psychological nuance.
-- The Boston Globe

Gilbert

Once in a great while, there appears a novel so spellbinding in its beauty and sensitivity that the reader devours it nearly whole, in great greedy gulps, and feels stretched sore afterwards, having been expanded and filled. Such a book is Michael Cunningham's A Home at the End of the World.
-- San Diego Tribune

Rosenthal

The four characters who narrate Michael Cunningham’s intricately threaded first novel come dramatically to life in this excellent reading. Bobby, read by Colin Farrell in a flat middle-American voice, is the understated center of this recording and the story itself, in which a gay man, a straight man, and an older woman set out to rear a baby together. Cunningham, who received the Pulitzer Prize for THE HOURS, is a matchless stylist whose eye for character and scene is rendered in immaculate images and metaphors. Individual narrators break at 20 to 30 minutes, ideal for exercising and tasking, the succulent prose allowing frequent breaks and interludes. But, beware. A particularly heartrending death will discombobulate you, whatever you’re doing, and the later seduction should not be experienced in public. D.A.W. © AudioFile 2004, Portland, Maine

OCT/NOV 04 - AudioFile

The four characters who narrate Michael Cunningham’s intricately threaded first novel come dramatically to life in this excellent reading. Bobby, read by Colin Farrell in a flat middle-American voice, is the understated center of this recording and the story itself, in which a gay man, a straight man, and an older woman set out to rear a baby together. Cunningham, who received the Pulitzer Prize for THE HOURS, is a matchless stylist whose eye for character and scene is rendered in immaculate images and metaphors. Individual narrators break at 20 to 30 minutes, ideal for exercising and tasking, the succulent prose allowing frequent breaks and interludes. But, beware. A particularly heartrending death will discombobulate you, whatever you’re doing, and the later seduction should not be experienced in public. D.A.W. © AudioFile 2004, Portland, Maine

OCT/ NOV 04 - AudioFile