"The Prince of Tides" is a Gem

 

Southern fiction is a genre which never lets me down. It’s produced such great storytellers as Harper Lee, Cormac McCarthy and the legendary Mark Twain. Another legendary writer in the southern tradition is Pat Conroy. Conroy’s 1986 novel “The Prince of Tides” is another classic of the southern tradition.

The novel is told from the point of view of Tom Wingo, a local high school coach with a wife and three young daughters. He loves his daughters, but he is also having marriage problems with his wife who reveals to him she is having an affair. This isn’t the main story of the novel, though. Tom’s history and how it affects his sister, Savannah who is in a mental hospital, and hallucinating is the main story. She is a poet in New York City and is a classic case of someone who comes to the big city wanting to escape small town life. Tom meets with her psychiatrist, Susan Lowestein. Lowenstein is a New Yorker through and through, while Tom is a southern boy. This could set up what seemed like a culture clash, but they are united in their desire to help Tom’s sister. Even more that that it seems. There is an instant attraction Tom has to Susan.

The history Tom tells Susan of the Wingo family is wide reaching and unusual. The Wingo family is a family who can’t seem to do anything normally. There’s the story of Tom’s grandmother who travelled the world, his Bible thumbing salesman of a grandfather, his mom who wants everything to appear good on the outside while everything is breaking apart and his father who is constantly trying to hit the big time instead of being a simple shrimp boatsman. These are classic American archetypes.

The Wingo siblings, Tom, Luke and Savannah, lived a rather unusual and in some ways, perfectly typical childhood. There is a rather shocking scene in their later teens of a brutal assault. The book goes back and forth between the adulthood and childhood of the Wingo family, and while there are lighter moments sprinkled throughout the book, there’s also a lot of traumas in there as well. Dysfunctional families are an area Conroy obviously knew well, and it shows in this book, and other books by him like his later novel “South of Broad”.

However, dysfunction and trauma aren’t the only things in Conroy’s books. There’s also a lot of charm. Conroy’s writing was known for being lush and that doesn’t change here. Conroy could really write. Stories of Tom being a football player, a road trip the kids took to Florida, and his sister trying on a dress when she became a older teenager are all charming.  Conroy writes lovingly of both the American south and New York City from an outsider’s point of view. Even though this is a long book, Conroy keeps the story going with multiple stories of the Wingo family and their various adventures. Later in the book, Luke becomes the focus and his defense of his hometown from developers trying to pay off the residents. While this could in the hands of a lesser writer feels tacked on, with Conroy, it doesn’t.

“The Prince of Tides” is well deserving of the critical acclaim it received back at it’s time of publication, and I was engrossed by the Wingo family and their various traumas and adventures. It’s a beautifully written novel and an adult one, as well. I understand why so many people love this book. It’s not only solid southern fiction, but also an honest reflection on childhood, adulthood, mental illness and the complications that come with family. No one seemed to explore this better than Pat Conroy did.