On the Waterfront

Building on his Academy Award-winning screenplay of the classic film, Budd Schulberg's On the Waterfront is the story of ex-prizefighter Terry Malloy's valiant stand against corruption on the New Jersey docks. It generates all the power, grittiness, and truth of that great production, but goes beyond it in set and setting. It is a novel of strength and fallibility, of hope and defeat, of love and betrayal. In his Introduction, Mr. Schulberg writes: "The film's concentration on a single dominating character, brought close to the camera eye, made it esthetically inconvenient, if not impossible, to set Terry's story in its social and historical perspective…suggesting the knotted complexities of the world of the waterfront that loops around New York."From BooklistStarred Review Johnson was a New York Sun reporter who won a Pulitzer Prize in 1949 for his series of 24 front-page articles in 1948, detailing crime on the New York waterfront. The series exposed what he called an "outlaw frontier," where organized criminals had a stranglehold on the ports. These gangs enforced their reign of terror through thievery, control of narcotics traffic, smuggling, shakedowns, kickbacks, bribery, extortion, and murder. They were allied with a crime cartel that Johnson labeled the syndicate--now known as the Mafia--that controlled organized crime in the U.S., including the powerful International Longshoremen's Union. Among the crime bosses were Charles (Lucky) Luciano, Frank Costello, and Meyer Lansky. Johnson's stories served as primary source material for investigations, as well as for novels, radio and TV shows, and movies--most notably On the Waterfront in 1954. Haynes Johnson, a Pulitzer Prize--winning journalist and son of Malcolm Johnson, has written an engrossing foreword. Budd Schulberg, the author of What Makes Sammy Run? (1940) and the screenplay for On the Waterfront, has written an equally informative introduction and related articles that appeared later in magazines. The book will renew interest in On the Waterfront with its brilliant cast that included Marlon Brando, Rod Steiger, Eva Marie Saint, Lee J. Cobb, and Karl Malden. The book is a gripping account of one man's courage and foresight that eventually brought down the Mob. George CohenCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reservedReviewA recovered jewel! -- Scott Liell, author of 46 PagesAn intriguing episodic account of true crime and survival on New York's outer edges. -- Kirkus ReviewsOn the Waterfront is a notable example of reportage that has outlasted its dateline. -- Matthew J. Bruccoli, author of Some Sort of Epic GrandeurOne of the proudest monuments in the history of investigative journalism.... -- Benjamin C. Bradlee, former editor, Washington PostTold brilliantly and authoritatively through the eyes and ears of a fearless reporter, ON THE WATERFRONT is a remarkable achievement. -- James MacGregor Burns, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian