On the Waterfront Book

Buddy read with my friend Nat. Thanks for suggesting the book, I loved it and would not have read it otherwise.

On the Waterfront tells the story of a fictional state investigation into corruption on the New Jersey docks, and of the lives it affected. Not too far from The New Colossus sits the fictional longshoreman's community of Bohegan. Home of the tired. The poor. The huddled masses yearning to breathe free. The wretched refuse of America's own teeming shore. When Emma Lazarus wrote those words in 1883, she probably intended her words to inspire hope, but the longshoremen of local 447 have long since had any such notion beaten from them by mobsters posing as their labor representatives.

Budd Schulberg painted a grim picture of poor people being used as a desperate, cheap, and disposable workforce, and a society that turns a blind eye. People with no options being kept in poverty by the devil they know, and sometimes at gunpoint. On the Waterfront is a tale of America, past, present, and future.

Father Barry is a priest who is meant to represent an external agent of change fighting a system that cannot and will not fix itself. He is not the kind of priest who rubs elbows with corrupt officials, and hides in his church. He is a devotee of Saint Francis Xavier, a firebrand, and a believer in The Living Christ. His mantra; "If you do it to the least of mine, you do it to me." As the longshoremen bleed, so does Father Barry.

Johnny Friendly stands in opposition to Father Barry's efforts to help the longshoremen of Bohegan find a better life. He has been "doing it to the least of mine" for a long, long time. Johnny is a mobster who runs the local labor union, affectionately referred to as "the pistol local" by its members, as only a mob boss can. Extortion, bribes, loan sharks, "short gangs," staged labor strikes, and rampant larceny are only the first page of Johnny's resume.

Terry Malloy is the punch-drunk and washed-up boxer who came close enough to a title shot to make him a local celebrity, and is caught in the middle. Caught between a conscience spurred by Father Barry, and a relatively easy life in the lap of Johnny's criminal organization. Terry has always sat on the fence, but when he is subpoenaed to testify for a murder he unwittingly took part in, he is forced to choose a side.

I gave this book five stars because I think it is still relevant, perhaps more today than when it was written. One only needs to open their favorite news website any day of the week to find On the Waterfront in our daily lives. Schulberg also did a fantastic job showing the consequences and complexities of changing widespread corruption. Change doesn't always come fast, if at all, but it always comes at a cost.

Recommended to everyone.