The Immortal Class: Bike Messengers and the Cult of Human Power
Posted by Levon in Books
The Immortal Class: Bike Messengers and the Cult of Human Power Travis Hugh Culley went to Chicago to make his name in its thriving theater scene, yet found in his day job a sense of community and fulfillment—and a brotherhood of like-minded individualists—that he encountered nowhere else.
In The Immortal Class, Culley takes us inside the heart and soul of an American urban icon: the bicycle messenger. In describing his own history and those of his peers, he evokes a classic American maverick, deeply woven into the fabric of society—from the pits of squalor to the highest reaches of power and privilege—yet always resolutely, exuberantly outside.
Culley’s voice is at once earthy and soaringly poetic—a Gen-X Tom Joad at hyperspeed. The Immortal Class is a unique personal and political narrative of a cyclist’s life on the street.
Customer Review: OK read. Self serving crap, ho hum
Bike messengering is quickly becoming an obsolete job thanks to the internet. Nice to see one person’s account of the scene back in it’s hayday. A little self serving at times but an enjoyable read non the less.
Customer Review: Preachy and Pretentious
I’ve read numerous biographies, most of which are veteran recollections of WWII or Vietnam. Harrowing stuff, but each one is similar: The authors state the story ‘as is’ without self grandizing themselves. Travis, on the other hand, thinks he’s God’s gift to the world, that messengers are some kind of elite angelic class put on the planet to battle against the rest of us. God, he goes on and on thumping his chest at every opportunity. I was really looking forward to a straight on biography about a bike messenger. THAT would be interesting. I certainly didn’t expect to read about a guy who puts himself and bike couriers above the rest of us.
Allow me to quote a small paragraph. This is when he puts his goggles on.
“The force field comes on the moment I set a pair of clear protective glasses across my eyes. I can’t work without them. They are all the protection I get from the social clatter, the dire poverty, and the proudly overbearing ignorance that these streets can offer. They are not just for dust and wind. They protect me from a well-deserverd cynicism about the human race in an arena where all divisions between us as people are revealed in horrific nudity. I see the stress and hardship hidden beneath our paper-thin presentations of kindness. I see the diseases of our everyday lives bury themselves beneath a thin veneer of language, and I have got to just live with it, openly, brotherly, constantly; everything - constantly.”
—- man, i gotta get myself a pair of those glasses…. the book is filled with monologues like this. I’m sure most people won’t want to read it - they bought this book to read about the life of bike messengers, not to attend Travis’ self-grandizing church sermons.
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