One of the seminal novels of post-World War II American letters, The Man with the Golden Arm is widely considered Algren's greatest and most enduring work.
[1] The novel details the trials and hardships of illicit card dealer "Frankie Machine", along with an assortment of colourful characters, on Chicago's Near Northwest Side.
A veteran of World War II, Frankie struggles to stabilize his personal life while trying to make ends meet and fight a growing addiction to morphine.
The title character is Francis Majcinek, known as "Frankie Machine," a young man of about 30 who is a gifted card dealer and an amateur drummer.
Frankie lives in a small apartment on Division Street in a Polish neighborhood with his wife, Sophie (nicknamed "Zosh").
Nifty Louie owed money to politically connected men, and finding his killer becomes a priority for the police department.
He flees to a flophouse, but without any hope of reuniting with Molly or staying free, he hangs himself in his room on April Fools' Day, 1948.
[9]In his 1981 obituary for Algren, Chicago newspaper columnist Mike Royko, who grew up near Division Street, recalled first reading the book while serving in the Korean War.
In a 1956 article for The New Yorker entitled "The Man with the Golden Beef," Norman Podhoretz was critical of what he saw as the glorification of the underclass at the expense of respectable society.
[11] This sentiment was shared by Leslie Fiedler in an article on Algren's writings for The Reporter entitled "The Noble Savages of Skid Row.
I guess they would have preferred that he write a novel about a Polish dentist who changed his name and moved from the old neighborhood to a suburb as soon as he made enough money.
Though author Nelson Algren was initially brought to Hollywood to work on the screenplay, he was quickly replaced by Walter Newman.
[3][13] Algren felt negatively about his experiences in Hollywood, the lack of compensation he received, and the liberties taken by the filmmakers (which included an entirely different ending from the novel).