The Treasure of the Sierra Madre: A Novel

As "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre" opens, Dobbs is sitting on an uncomfortable bench, "[working] his mind to answer the question: How can I get some money right now?" In post-revolutionary Mexico, that's a tough question to answer. Men from all over the world have drifted in to drill for oil, but while a few make their fortunes, far more find themselves struggling to survive. Dobbs is reduced to begging in the streets; finding this inadequate, he goes around the Mexican countryside searching unsuccessfully for work. Back in town, he thinks his luck has changed when a building contractor offers him a job, but that falls flat when his unscrupulous new employer attempts to cheat him out of his hard-earned wages. Working on the building job, he meets Curtin, another down-and-out American drifter, and they toss around the idea of heading out to the mountains to mine for gold. It's just talk, however, until Dobbs meets experienced prospector Howard, whose even-tempered cynicism serves as a foil to the younger men's hot-headed enthusiasm.So begins B. Traven's best-known novel, a gripping adventure story as well as an elegant meditation on the evils of greed. When Dobbs first encounters Howard, the wise old prospector is talking of his experiences to another pair of young men. Gold, he tells them in his first sentence of dialogue, is "a very devilish sort of a thing, believe me, boys. In the first place, it changes your character entirely. When you have it your soul is no longer the same as it was before. No getting away from that. . . . You cease to distinguish between right and wrong. You can no longer see clearly what is good and what is bad. You lose your judgment. That's what it is." This is the novel's thesis statement, as it were. For a work of fiction to state its theme outright is usually considered amateurish at best; even in a children's story it comes across as dull and insufferably preachy, but somehow Traven makes it work. Although gold as an inescapable agent of corruption is one of Howard's favorite conversational topics, with some variation of his original speech occurring in nearly every chapter of the next 150 pages, it never comes across as Traven preaching at us so much as it seems an omen of dark foreboding, like the solemn declamations of a Greek chorus.It's not a particularly streamlined novel; stripped of digressions and subplots (including three chapters which stand nearly as self-contained short stories in their own right), this 300-page volume could easily have been a slender novella. These digressions, however, many of which are among the most fascinating portions of the book, serve only to underscore and illustrate the theme of corruption and greed: the desperation of bandits who live and die by the sword, frantic and ill-fated searches for lost legendary mines, the deliberate acts of inefficiency and waste by the oilmen in order to push up their prices (now there's one that should resonate with anyone who's had to buy a tank of gas lately). At the heart of it all, of course, are our three protagonists, Curtin, Dobbs, and Howard. I won't spoil the particulars - I hope you find the final chapters as shocking and suspenseful as I did - but Traven has led us almost from the start to anticipate disharmony, obsession, paranoia, and violence as the inevitable byproducts of their quest, and he delivers on this promise in splendid fashion. The novel is flavored throughout with mordant wit and sardonic twists, but the irony in the end is so thick and delicious you'll want to cut yourself a slice and eat it with a fork.Savvy readers will recognize here something of a retelling of Chaucer's "Pardoner's Tale." Fans of adventure novels will devour it, but the appeal of this novel transcends genre: it's just one heck of a good story by any standard. Traven has given us a treasure every bit as wonderful, and far more accessible, than any cache of precious metals in the mountains of Mexico.

“The Treasure of Sierra Madre” is a really well written adventure story set in Mexico after World War I and before World War II. It is written in modern conversational English and is mostly easily followed. The novel is of medium length with numerous natural breaks which makes the novel easy to follow and read with necessary breaks for other activities. I read the entire novel in a week of intermittent reading. I completely enjoyed it. It has its dark side and is not a light read. There is a lesson to be learned.The author, B. Traven, seemingly is as much a mystery as his novel. This is the first work that I have read of his. After looking him up it appears that the consensus is that he is of European Heritage. Left completely to my own devices, I would have thought that he is an American, male, white, veteran of World War I, in Europe, at the front, and probably an officer. I am intrigued…I read this novel recently in 2021. This is during the ongoing Covid episode. I found it to be a remarkable coincidence that there is a relatively short chapter, Chapter 18 I believe, seemingly not essential to the rest of the story, almost an aside, wherein a group of Americans are asked to participate in free vaccinations provided by the government, to allay the concerns of reluctant local residents in a rural area to vaccinate themselves and their children. No big deal, just interesting…In summary I really liked this short, taut, medium length novel. It is dark and I don’t like to read novels such as this constantly because of a dark cynical mood that they can evoke. However I really like to read novels such as this intermittently mixed with lighter work. And this a good one. Thank you for taking the time to read this review.

I don't really know how to even start rating this book. I think my first mistake was watching the movie first and then reading the novel. I am giving the book a 4 star rating because it started the making of the classic movie. The movie was MUCH better than the novel. Why??? Because the movie whittled down the BEST parts of the novel. In the movie we get to see the eventual emotional breakdown of the protagonist Dobbs (played by Humphrey Bogart) in such a graphic way. Whereas the novel meanders to the end until he starts to break down.I was also shocked at how much profanity there was in the book (and Spanish F bombs too! I now because I read Spanish too) I bought this book thinking it was going to be a clean read...OH NO!!!! The F bomb in English was there too but replaced by the word 'Funking'. Yeah you get the point.The ONLY reason I am giving it a 4 star rating instead of a 2-3 star is because this book sparked the great imagination of the film producer John Huston.

Quality craftsmanship.

A wonderful and stark parable of greed and lawlessness, with a smidgeon of hope from those who manage, against fate and temptation, to stay true to some kind of moral conscience. Highly recommended!

A classic. Great book and a great film starring Humphrey Bogart.

Great

Don't expect this to be like the film if you've seen that before! Although it's a fairly easy read and not at all dated considering it was written in the 1930s there's a lot of historical detail that's revealed as part of story-telling by one of the main characters. I'd recommend not skipping over that too much in the desire to get back to the story in 'now time' as actually it kind of adds to one's understanding of the novel as a whole as regards man's greed when it comes to gold! Essentially that's what the story's about. As I had seen the film before I'd ever read the book some of the events were fairly well etched in my mind and it comes as a surprise when the story takes a different course to what you've expected but that adds to the experience and enjoyment of the tale, probably later! Someone asked me if I visualised Huston, Bogart, Bennett, Bedoya and Holt etc as I was reading it and to be honest, YES! Walter Huston also looks exactly like the drawing of the grizzled old prospector on my cover which was different to that seen in the picture. Hardly surprising as it was done for the 1989 edition. However, my copy also had a facsimile of the author B. Traven's signature which I suppose is a bonus. He was an enigmatic character, a real man of mystery who could have come from anywhere in Europe! My edition cost $10.95 originally. As a Brit I don't know if that was a good price then but as the book was in excellent condition, just a little faded, whatever I paid, just a couple of quid in 2017 was well worth it. Needless to say the packaging was very good so I'd unreservedly recommend the seller.