The novel of John O’Brien Leaving Las Vegas

The novel of John O’Brien Leaving Las Vegas is, in my opinion, the shrillest novel I’ve read from the scope of drinking stories. Traditionally, it’s called a suicide note, for in two weeks after finishing the book the author shot himself. With regard to a human’s attitude to the alcohol two tendencies usually take place when drinking is at odds with other aspects of human life, at first there’s a desire to achieve harmony, to arrange drinking sessions in a way that they do not interfere (or in addict’s illusion even help) other aspects of life. Then a long and, as a rule, unsuccessful fight begins for the values attacked by alcohol. Then like for John O’Brien’s character the reality is a dream about a place like Las Vegas where alcohol is sold 24 hours a day. What happens later is seen at the character’s life: social death moves the psychological death. A human becomes an experimental mouse pressing the pedal on striving to drink that dies biologically sooner or later. Of course, a human in contrast to a mouse is sometimes able to come up with an appropriate philosophy for such a life (a right to drink freely, a right to suicide), but it change nothing of the main point of it doesn’t change.