Naked and the Dead, The, is a famous novel by the American author Norman Mailer. The story is set during World War II (1939-1945) and describes American soldiers fighting the Japanese on a fictitious Japanese-held jungle island called Anopopei in the South Pacific Ocean. The Naked and the Dead was published in 1948, when Mailer was 25 years old, and is considered one of the best American novels to emerge from the war. Its critical and commercial success made Mailer an immediate literary celebrity and established him as one of the foremost American writers of the second half of the 1900’s.
Mailer based The Naked and the Dead on his own Army experiences fighting in World War II. The story follows an American Army platoon as it battles the Japanese on the island. The many principal characters in the novel include General Cummings, Lieutenant Hearn, Sergeant Croft, and about a dozen soldiers in the platoon. The novel describes combat with realism and intensity. Flashbacks provide accounts of the various characters before they entered the Army. The story portrays personality conflicts among the officers and enlisted men and how the brutality of warfare affects the characters. The novel’s language and descriptions are often violent as Mailer captures the behavior of the troops under the stress of battle.
See also Mailer, Norman.
