The author, well known to me as a poet, was a volunteer ambulance driver in France during the First World War. He was imprisoned for suspected anti-war sentiment, but eventually released and returned to the US. This is his account of his imprisonment. I’d never heard of either his imprisonment or this work, but it was apparently quite controversial when published in the early 1920s. Several critics bombed it, essentially for being politically radical. Some critics praised it but said that it was a work of fiction and some compared it to The Pilgrim's Progress (The author has a characteristic descriptive style, which I found irritating, but he specifically denies that the book is fiction [but, what does that mean?]).

Anyway, Cummings' account held my interest, but I had some problems with it. I know Cummings was a young man, but his account has a definite adolescent quality replete with various highly offensive slang terms for his fellow inmates. The book is peppered with French; single words, phrases, and longer amounts. I suppose this is to give the flavor of the situation. I know a few words of French, but I was constantly using the Kindle to translate. Some of the words may be the slang of the times since I could not translate them. It didn’t seem to me that the book would have lost anything by being written all in one language or the other. Lastly, the book is described as sort of an ur-Catch 22. But it is hardly that. Furthermore, I'm familiar with several other anti-war writings of the time that are superior. I think this book’s obscurity is understandable. ( )

A summer camp romp where the punch lines are in French. ( )

Good novel, but not close to Russian lit when it comes to prison life ( )

I found e.e. cumming's novel "The Enormous Room" to be a challenging and dull read.

It's an autobiographical story about the time he was imprisoned in France following his service as an ambulance driver during World War I for (erroneous) suspicions of treason.

He is transported to a series of prisons where he meets a variety of people, which he describes in great detail, before his eventual release four months later.

I was just bored by this book -- which has dense prose and plenty of French sprinkled through it -- my mind kept wandering and I frequently was wondering if I missed something that makes this tale interesting. I'm glad cummings mostly stuck to poetry. ( )

I liked this book a lot. What made it so special, I'm not sure. After all, the most part of it has a setting that is limited to a few rooms, in which a few main characters live in captivity during the last year of WWI.
It must have been the different voices of all that men, the well pronounced French, the every day struggles and troubles that are told.
One of the better 1001-books, at least to me. ( )