Literary Fiction · DarkA Chicago card dealer and amateur drummer struggles to steady his home life and a morphine habit
The Man with the Golden Arm
A gifted card dealer who is also a World War II veteran fights to keep his home life together and to break a morphine habit
Francis Majcinek, known as Frankie Machine, is a skilled dealer of illicit card games and an amateur drummer on Chicago's Near Northwest Side. He is a World War II veteran, and he developed a morphine addiction while being treated during the war. His home life is strained, and the novel follows him through the neighborhood around Division Street and Milwaukee Avenue from 1946 to 1948.
More about this book
Who
Frankie Machine, a gifted card dealer and amateur drummer, and a World War II veteran.
World
The Polish neighborhood on Chicago's Near Northwest Side, around Division Street and Milwaukee Avenue, in the years 1946 to 1948.
What makes it different
It was adapted into a 1955 film directed by Otto Preminger and starring Frank Sinatra, which used a different ending from the novel.
Feel
Gritty and bleak. It won the 1950 National Book Award for Fiction.
Page count and cover shown for: Selected edition
Further reading
- The Man with the Golden ArmWikipedia