The Last Hurrah, by Edwin O’Connor, Atlantic, Little, Brown Books 1956
Foremost, O’Connor’s political masterpiece is a 400+ page eulogy to the singular power of charisma. Frank Skeffington, as mayor of an unnamed (though thinly guised) Northeast city is, dependent on whose opinion is sought, a loathsome or lovable, extortionate or benevolent rascal of a politician. With a proud Irish heritage as the bedrock of his convictions, he’s held a bedazzling sway over the populace of his constituents for the first half of the twentieth century.
O’Connor’s novel, published in 1956, opens in the twilight of Skeffington’s political reign, having announced at age 70 that he will again defend his title. This public declaration is coupled with a personal invitation extended to his nephew Adam Caulfield to join his campaign in an observer role. A newspaper cartoonist disinterested in politics, Adam’s is a reluctant acceptance. His initial hesitation however, is converted to transfixed admiration in the heat and madness of the campaign, and as he bears witness to the ingenuity of its master.
Explicitly and entirely the irrepressible head of the city’s political machine, Skeffington’s façade as such dissolves against his nephew’s shrewdness as the race culminates towards election day. The mayor, in unconscious response, softens his guard, behind which lies a quiet humanity. O’Connor invites us to see the desperation and loneliness concealed behind the dual veils of power and action. When such veils become backdrops, the emotions become exponentially more affecting.
The Last Hurrah is a venerable peer to Robert Penn Warren’s All the King’s Men. The astute introspection of the latter on Southern politics is matched by its Northern contemporary. As long as politics paint the American aesthetic, such novels and the lessons contained therein, will illuminate the canvas.