His skill in characterization, his narrative power and his somewhat cynical humor are all outstanding.

Berger’s success in capturing the points of view and emotional atmosphere of a vanished era is uncanny. It was fun to see the boyishly aging cops of CHiPs on the road againand just about everybody hopes Mary and Rhoda will get together once more. surely must be one of the most delightfully absurd fictional fossils ever unearthed.” - Time “The very best novel ever about the American West.” - The New York Times Book Review “An epic such as Mark Twain might have given us.” -Henry Miller Hailed by The Nation as “a seminal event,” Little Big Man is a singular literary achievement that, like its hero, only gets better with age. Fawcett Crest, Cheyenne Indians - 447 pages. In the 'Foreword by a Man of Letters' to Thomas Bergers Little Big Man (1964), the fictional Ralph Fielding Snell recounts how back in 1952 he came to record the life story of the late Jack Crabb-frontiersman, Indian scout, gunfighter, buffalo hunter, adopted Cheyenne-in his final days upon this earth. This Study Guide consists of approximately 34 pages of chapter summaries, quotes, character analysis, themes, and more - everything you need to sharpen your knowledge of Little Big Man. Later, living as a white man once more, he hunts the buffalo to near-extinction, tangles with Wyatt Earp, cheats Wild Bill Hickok, and fights in the Battle of Little Bighorn alongside Custer himself-a man he’d sworn to kill. Little Big Man - Foreword Summary & Analysis. As a Cheyenne, he feasts on dog, loves four wives, and sees his people butchered by horse soldiers commanded by General George Armstrong Custer. Berger claimed the Western as serious literature with this savage and epic account of one man’s extraordinary double life.Īfter surviving the massacre of his pioneer family, ten-year-old Jack is adopted by an Indian chief who nicknames him Little Big Man. “The truth is always made up of little particulars which sound ridiculous when repeated.” So says Jack Crabb, the 111-year-old narrator of Thomas Berger’s 1964 masterpiece of American fiction, Little Big Man.

Little Big Man by Thomas Berger