E. L. Doctorow

Welcome to America at the turn of the twentieth century, where the rhythms of ragtime set the beat. In this chronicle, real-life characters intermingle with three families, one black, one Jewish, and one prosperous WASP, to create a literary mosaic that brings to life an era of poverty, wealth, and incredible change in short, the era of ragtime.

Ragtime

A Novel

Literal chills. Who gave E.L. Doctrow permission to write like this and put something THIS ICONIC on page 5. PAGE 5!!!

Sarah Jackson

'And though the newspapers called the shooting the Crime of the Century, Goldman knew it was only 1906 and there were 94 years to go' - E.L. Doctrow

Sarah Sammis

heleen de boever

Clare B

I had no idea what I was getting into when I picked up Ragtime at the airport, but this book was great! A fascinating snapshot of NY just after the turn of the last century.

Haley Murray

3.75. Great to read if you love the musical.

Janet Doré

Even though I'll die trying, I'm determined to try to read as many of the 1,000 Books to Read Before You Die—Ragtime made the list.

It's set in the early 1900's in New York (New Rochelle and New York City), between 1902 to 1912 to be exact. The central theme is racism and the story is about how one upstanding black man handles an egregious incident directed at him.

Let's get the oddities out of the way...

It's unclear who the narrator is as he is not of the time and place of the story. After poking around Google a bit, I've concluded it was likely Doctorow himself. This keeps you a bit emotionally disconnected from the story as you are simply an observer. In fact, the story reads a lot like a non-fiction book.

Doctorow was not a big believer in paragraphs, not even for dialogue, nor were there any quotation marks. 

The underlying story was riveting and timeless, and could easily be set in the same place and happen today—one sign of a true classic. It left me feeling both heartened by how far we've come with the issue of racism and saddened by how stuck we are. Ragtime should definitely be on your #BLACKLIVESMATTER reading list.

You'll spend time getting to know real life characters, including Evelyn Nesbit, Harry Houdini and JP Morgan. What a fun way to learn about this fascinating time in history!

Unlike many classics, I didn't find it dry or boring. I immediately watched the movie (again) to get a better sense of the characters. Although, for obvious reasons, it didn't delve as deeply into the historic details as the book, it was very well done and, I believe, stayed pretty true Doctorow’s vision.

Ragtime

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