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Analysis Of The Book ' Last Exit On Brooklyn ' By Hubert Selby Jr.

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Julio Serrano
Professor Schuler
English 101
15 September 2016
Expository Essay-Classification Fate. This is a general topic that catches the attention of most people when it comes to one living their day-to-day life. With free-will being pretty much nonexistent for the believers in fate, it is arguable that one’s actions change your fate. Much controversy is created involving this topic, especially in a unique literary text named Last Exit to Brooklyn by Hubert Selby Jr. This novel consists of six short stories taking place in the slums of lower-class Brooklyn, New York throughout the 1950’s. This novel has aroused much controversy because of Selby’s blunt style of writing involving drugs, sex, prostitution, and violence. Many readers found the novel offensive during the time it was published because they worried about the fragility of innocence of the general public, so much that it was even banned in Italy and was held in trial throughout the United Kingdom at the time. Although it is true that Selby had no restraint when it came to the use of vulgar language or actions, he had a purpose for his unique style of writing. His purpose was to try and show how real-life people lived their daily lives through the depiction of his characters. These short stories within the novel show how the characters kept busy in order to avoid the inevitable boredom which would consume them, how they survived from day to day through unethical actions because of the rough environment, or

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