WEST'S `DAY OF THE LOCUST' SHOWS DARK SIDE OF HOLLYWOOD DREAM.

Byline: Bernadette Murphy Special to the Daily News

The dark side of the California dream was first introduced into literature with Nathanael West's ``The Day of the Locust,'' a disturbing novel about the falseness of Hollywood and the cynicism that is bred here. This 1939 classic will be the subject of discussion on ``StoryLines California,'' a public radio program this evening.

In many ways, ``The Day of the Locust'' represents a turning point in the way California had been portrayed in literature, taking the reader from the limitless frontier of a mythic paradise to the harsh reality of a darker realm.

``This book gives us the downside. It's the first time we really see the fundamental illusion that has come to define California,'' said David L. Ulin, ``StoryLines'' co-host.

West's narrative takes the fantasy of star-struck Hollywood, complete with stage lights and movie premieres, to the failure that meets many who come in search of that fantasy. In this respect, Ulin said, it is a truly modern work.

Describing the newcomers who arrive in Hollywood and find disenchantment, West wrote, ``they discover that sunshine isn't enough. They get tired of oranges, even of avocado pears and passion fruit. Nothing happens. . . Their boredom becomes more and more terrible. They realize that they've been tricked and burn with resentment. Every day of their lives they read the newspapers and went to the movies. Both fed them on lynchings, murder, sex crimes, explosions, wrecks, love nests, fires, miracles, revolutions, wars. This daily diet made sophisticates of them. The sun is a joke. Oranges can't titillate their jaded palates. Nothing can ever be violent enough to make taut their slack minds and bodies. They have been cheated and betrayed. They have slaved and saved for nothing.''

The volatile mix of betrayal and boredom in the novel fuels an intensity that turns violent. Tod, the main character, aspires to paint ``the burning of Los Angeles.'' As the narrative unfolds and the illusions are seen for the absurdities they are, Tod's apocalyptic vision becomes reality. In this way, West captures an unsettling mix between realism and surrealism, poignancy and comedy that is apropos today.

Co-host Lynell George said that ``Locust'' stares right into the face of cynicism. ``I'm intrigued with how discomfiting this book is. Its surreal and bleak on so many levels - the descriptions, the way the reader is jerked through narrative. It's like stepping on shards of people's lives throughout.'' One of the scenes that best encapsulates the ``false-front theme,'' for George, is at the beginning of the novel, when Tod notes that everyone in Hollywood is dressed in sports clothes, though no one is playing sports. ``It's a parade of masks, a ball. Everyone's in costume, trying to be something they're not. They're all trying to fix something that, at its center, can't be fixed,'' she said.

According to Ulin, Nathanael West is an undervalued writer. ``He was the first to integrate popular-culture themes, to weave them into a piece of fiction that is also social criticism,'' she said. West's techniques were 20 or 30 years ahead of his time. ``Without West, we wouldn't have the black humorists that came along later, writers like Joseph Heller and T.C. Boyle and Terry Southern,'' he said, adding that the reason West is overlooked at times is that he exists outside the traditions by which we define literature. ``West occupies an important influential and transitional place,'' Ulin said. ``I'd hope that this program will draw some overdue attention to him as a writer. He deserves more credit than he gets.''

Writer John Stanton, who was a personal friend of West's, participates in Sunday's program, along with David Reid, author of ``Sex, Death and God in L.A.'' Listeners are encouraged to join the conversation by calling in with questions and comments.

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Photo: no caption (Book cover -- THE DAY OF THE LOCUST)