#usliterature — Public Fediverse posts

I've read about Ayn Rand, and I've read short extracts from "Atlas Shrugged", supposedly her magnum opus.

Those extracts did not inspire me to plough through the whole of "Atlas Shrugged", but I thought to be fair I ought to read a complete work of hers, so I picked up a copy of her 1938 novella "Anthem".

In a repressive, techophobic, collectivist dystopia, a young man rebels, rediscovers electricity, and then escapes from captivity to be joined by his female lover. He hopes to rebuild a society based on individualism -- "Anthem" concludes with the protagonist determined to carve into the stone portal of his fort the "sacred word EGO".

Rand's writing is lifeless, with both characters and setting being little more than vehicles for the author's ponderous didacticism. The slight romance narrative smacks of sub-Hollywood teenage fantasy, with the protagonist renaming his lover "The Golden One", followed by her dubbing him 'The Unconquered".

The concluding pages are supposed to be a poetic invocation of egoism. Instead, they come across as Rand attempting to club the reader into submission.

I am pained to learn that this book is frequently assigned in US high schools, as it is devoid of literary merit and of no great significance in literary or cultural history. If teachers or school districts want to assign a mid 20C "antitotalitarian" work, why not press copies of "1984" into students' hands?

Nevertheless my afternoon was not entirely wasted, as I can now get through the rest of my life without having to read another word of this tiresome crank, yet have a clear conscience when I describe her as possessing not a shred of literary talent, because my judgment is based on a first hand acquaintance with her writing.

#Books #Literature #USLiterature #AmericanLiterature #AynRand #Anthem #RightWing

I've read about Ayn Rand, and I've read short extracts from "Atlas Shrugged", supposedly her magnum opus.

Those extracts did not inspire me to plough through the whole of "Atlas Shrugged", but I thought to be fair I ought to read a complete work of hers, so I picked up a copy of her 1938 novella "Anthem".

In a repressive, techophobic, collectivist dystopia, a young man rebels, rediscovers electricity, and then escapes from captivity to be joined by his female lover. He hopes to rebuild a society based on individualism -- "Anthem" concludes with the protagonist determined to carve into the stone portal of his fort the "sacred word EGO".

Rand's writing is lifeless, with both characters and setting being little more than vehicles for the author's ponderous didacticism. The slight romance narrative smacks of sub-Hollywood teenage fantasy, with the protagonist renaming his lover "The Golden One", followed by her dubbing him 'The Unconquered".

The concluding pages are supposed to be a poetic invocation of egoism. Instead, they come across as Rand attempting to club the reader into submission.

I am pained to learn that this book is frequently assigned in US high schools, as it is devoid of literary merit and of no great significance in literary or cultural history. If teachers or school districts want to assign a mid 20C "antitotalitarian" work, why not press copies of "1984" into students' hands?

Nevertheless my afternoon was not entirely wasted, as I can now get through the rest of my life without having to read another word of this tiresome crank, yet have a clear conscience when I describe her as possessing not a shred of literary talent, because my judgment is based on a first hand acquaintance with her writing.

#Books #Literature #USLiterature #AmericanLiterature #AynRand #Anthem #RightWing

I've read about Ayn Rand, and I've read short extracts from "Atlas Shrugged", supposedly her magnum opus.

Those extracts did not inspire me to plough through the whole of "Atlas Shrugged", but I thought to be fair I ought to read a complete work of hers, so I picked up a copy of her 1938 novella "Anthem".

In a repressive, techophobic, collectivist dystopia, a young man rebels, rediscovers electricity, and then escapes from captivity to be joined by his female lover. He hopes to rebuild a society based on individualism -- "Anthem" concludes with the protagonist determined to carve into the stone portal of his fort the "sacred word EGO".

Rand's writing is lifeless, with both characters and setting being little more than vehicles for the author's ponderous didacticism. The slight romance narrative smacks of sub-Hollywood teenage fantasy, with the protagonist renaming his lover "The Golden One", followed by her dubbing him 'The Unconquered".

The concluding pages are supposed to be a poetic invocation of egoism. Instead, they come across as Rand attempting to club the reader into submission.

I am pained to learn that this book is frequently assigned in US high schools, as it is devoid of literary merit and of no great significance in literary or cultural history. If teachers or school districts want to assign a mid 20C "antitotalitarian" work, why not press copies of "1984" into students' hands?

Nevertheless my afternoon was not entirely wasted, as I can now get through the rest of my life without having to read another word of this tiresome crank, yet have a clear conscience when I describe her as possessing not a shred of literary talent, because my judgment is based on a first hand acquaintance with her writing.

#Books #Literature #USLiterature #AmericanLiterature #AynRand #Anthem #RightWing

I've read about Ayn Rand, and I've read short extracts from "Atlas Shrugged", supposedly her magnum opus.

Those extracts did not inspire me to plough through the whole of "Atlas Shrugged", but I thought to be fair I ought to read a complete work of hers, so I picked up a copy of her 1938 novella "Anthem".

In a repressive, techophobic, collectivist dystopia, a young man rebels, rediscovers electricity, and then escapes from captivity to be joined by his female lover. He hopes to rebuild a society based on individualism -- "Anthem" concludes with the protagonist determined to carve into the stone portal of his fort the "sacred word EGO".

Rand's writing is lifeless, with both characters and setting being little more than vehicles for the author's ponderous didacticism. The slight romance narrative smacks of sub-Hollywood teenage fantasy, with the protagonist renaming his lover "The Golden One", followed by her dubbing him 'The Unconquered".

The concluding pages are supposed to be a poetic invocation of egoism. Instead, they come across as Rand attempting to club the reader into submission.

I am pained to learn that this book is frequently assigned in US high schools, as it is devoid of literary merit and of no great significance in literary or cultural history. If teachers or school districts want to assign a mid 20C "antitotalitarian" work, why not press copies of "1984" into students' hands?

Nevertheless my afternoon was not entirely wasted, as I can now get through the rest of my life without having to read another word of this tiresome crank, yet have a clear conscience when I describe her as possessing not a shred of literary talent, because my judgment is based on a first hand acquaintance with her writing.

#Books #Literature #USLiterature #AmericanLiterature #AynRand #Anthem #RightWing

I've read about Ayn Rand, and I've read short extracts from "Atlas Shrugged", supposedly her magnum opus.

Those extracts did not inspire me to plough through the whole of "Atlas Shrugged", but I thought to be fair I ought to read a complete work of hers, so I picked up a copy of her 1938 novella "Anthem".

In a repressive, techophobic, collectivist dystopia, a young man rebels, rediscovers electricity, and then escapes from captivity to be joined by his female lover. He hopes to rebuild a society based on individualism -- "Anthem" concludes with the protagonist determined to carve into the stone portal of his fort the "sacred word EGO".

Rand's writing is lifeless, with both characters and setting being little more than vehicles for the author's ponderous didacticism. The slight romance narrative smacks of sub-Hollywood teenage fantasy, with the protagonist renaming his lover "The Golden One", followed by her dubbing him 'The Unconquered".

The concluding pages are supposed to be a poetic invocation of egoism. Instead, they come across as Rand attempting to club the reader into submission.

I am pained to learn that this book is frequently assigned in US high schools, as it is devoid of literary merit and of no great significance in literary or cultural history. If teachers or school districts want to assign a mid 20C "antitotalitarian" work, why not press copies of "1984" into students' hands?

Nevertheless my afternoon was not entirely wasted, as I can now get through the rest of my life without having to read another word of this tiresome crank, yet have a clear conscience when I describe her as possessing not a shred of literary talent, because my judgment is based on a first hand acquaintance with her writing.

#Books #Literature #USLiterature #AmericanLiterature #AynRand #Anthem #RightWing

Time for a new #BookAtBedtime. So, tonight I will be starting #OfMiceAndMen by #JohnSteinbeck.

#Books #Literature #USLiterature #ClassicFiction

Time for a new #BookAtBedtime. So, tonight I will be starting #OfMiceAndMen by #JohnSteinbeck.

#Books #Literature #USLiterature #ClassicFiction

Time for a new #BookAtBedtime. So, tonight I will be starting #OfMiceAndMen by #JohnSteinbeck.

#Books #Literature #USLiterature #ClassicFiction

Time for a new #BookAtBedtime. So, tonight I will be starting #OfMiceAndMen by #JohnSteinbeck.

#Books #Literature #USLiterature #ClassicFiction

Time for a new #BookAtBedtime. So, tonight I will be starting #OfMiceAndMen by #JohnSteinbeck.

#Books #Literature #USLiterature #ClassicFiction

Earlier this evening I enjoyed the satisfaction of coming to the end of a book I enjoyed very much, Dawn Powell's 1948 novel "The Locusts Have No King".

I've posted about this author before; this is the fifth novel of hers I have read, and it impressed me as possibly the best so far. Beneath the sharp observation of literary New York and mid-century Manhattan mores lies a tale full of insight about the relations between men and women. The author provides plenty of amused skepticism about what we tell ourselves and others about our motives and hopes in the ups and downs of love and friendship, but this skepticism never lapses into a shallow cynicism about human nature. Instead, as happens with a comedy at its best, we are left both amused and moved.

Andrew Wheeler had a slightly different but thoughtful take on the book here:
https://antickmusings.blogspot.com/2023/11/the-locusts-have-no-king-by-dawn-powell.html

As Wheeler notes, "The Locusts Have No King" is not a book for everyone; you must have a taste for adult satire that is never coarse but which can sting at times. If you are, or aspire to be, that adult, I would strongly recommend that you hurry along to your library or bookshop now!

#Books #DawnPowell #TheLocustsHaveNoKing #Fiction #Novels #AmericanLiterature #USLiterature #NewYork #LiteratureInEnglish #1940s

James Baldwin's "Giovanni's Room" impressed me both for its exploration of love, sex, and sexual identity and for the skill with which the author has the narrative unfold; I was gripped from beginning to end.

Although the protagonist is white, I know that some critics believe that the theme of race is obliquely present by virtue of the salience of various kinds of minority identity throughout the novel.

Quite aside from it being a "good read", I would recommend it to anybody interested in the literary treatment of bisexuality.

Expatriation also figures as an important theme. These words hit home with this migrant:

>> You don't have a home until you leave it and then, when you have left it, you never can go back. <<

"Home", of course, can be more than a geographical location.

#Books #GiovannisRoom #JamesBaldwin #Fiction #AmericanLiterature #USLiterature #AfricanAmericanLiterature #QueerFiction #LiteratureInEnglish #Sexuality #Bisexuality #20thCenturyLiterature #1950s #Homosexuality #Gay #Expatriates #Migrants

https://harpers.org/archive/2026/01/in-the-aftermath-of-victory-vince-passaro/

Cowley " would be involved with just about everything and everybody of literary consequence during those years. That is not hyperbole; a list would include Faulkner, Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Kerouac, and Cheever, as well as John Dos Passos, Ezra Pound, Hart Crane, Eugene O’Neill, E. E. Cummings, Ken Kesey, Thornton Wilder, Edmund Wilson, Archibald MacLeish, Alfred Kazin, Mary McCarthy, Lionel Trilling, James T. Farrell, Alexander Calder, Dwight Macdonald, Dawn Powell, John Updike, Kenneth Burke, Allen Tate, Conrad Aiken, Marianne Moore, Van Wyck Brooks, Wallace Stegner, Larry McMurtry, Dorothy Day, Mike Gold, Robert Penn Warren, John Berryman, Saul Bellow, and Eudora Welty."

#USLiterature #AmericanLiterature #MalcolmCowley #GeraldHoward #TheInsider #20thCenturyLiterature #Books

What a delight it was to read Dawn Powell's 1936 "Turn, Magic Wheel", in which urbane literary satire intertwines with an acute account of the deceptions and self-deceptions of love and marriage!

I found Powell's wit and style especially refreshing after having recently waded through the self important verbosity of Thomas Wolfe's "Look Homeward, Angel".

#Books #DawnPowell #TurnMagicWheel #AmericanLiterature #USLiterature #Novel #Satire #NewYorkLiterature ##20thCenturyLiterature #Thirties #1930s

Thomas Wolfe -- Look Homeward, Angel

It's not often that I have to take a break from a book, but I needed three days off from page after page of purple prose about people neither pleasant nor entertaining nor interesting.

Wolfe's 1929 Bildungsroman, a coming of age in North Carolina novel, was once thought to put Wolfe on a level with Hemingway or Faulkner.

Not many critics would hold him in such esteem today; I believe this revaluation is well deserved. Wolfe never used one word when he could cram in ten, preferably with much "poetic" diction and overuse of alliteration. Not every writer has to write the stripped down prose of Hemingway, not every darling has to be murdered, but an editorial slaughter would have been welcome here.* Wolfe also lacks the insight and imagination exercised by Faulkner with regard to race in the South.

Getting to the last of the 500 plus pages of wordy self indulgence this afternoon felt like the end of an ordeal.

Am I being unfair? Wolfe is sometimes described as an author best appreciated by young men. I admit that I might well have been impressed had I read him as an adolescent; I'm glad I did not, as the book might have done irreparable damage to my prose style.

#Books #ThomasWolfe #LookHomewardAngel #USLiterature #AmericanLiterature #20thCenturyLiterature #NorthCarolina #Bildungsroman

Thomas Wolfe -- Look Homeward, Angel

It's not often that I have to take a break from a book, but I needed three days off from page after page of purple prose about people neither pleasant nor entertaining nor interesting.

Wolfe's 1929 Bildungsroman, a coming of age in North Carolina novel, was once thought to put Wolfe on a level with Hemingway or Faulkner.

Not many critics would hold him in such esteem today; I believe this revaluation is well deserved. Wolfe never used one word when he could cram in ten, preferably with much "poetic" diction and overuse of alliteration. Not every writer has to write the stripped down prose of Hemingway, not every darling has to be murdered, but an editorial slaughter would have been welcome here.* Wolfe also lacks the insight and imagination exercised by Faulkner with regard to race in the South.

Getting to the last of the 500 plus pages of wordy self indulgence this afternoon felt like the end of an ordeal.

Am I being unfair? Wolfe is sometimes described as an author best appreciated by young men. I admit that I might well have been impressed had I read him as an adolescent; I'm glad I did not, as the book might have done irreparable damage to my prose style.

#Books #ThomasWolfe #LookHomewardAngel #USLiterature #AmericanLiterature #20thCenturyLiterature #NorthCarolina #Bildungsroman

Thomas Wolfe -- Look Homeward, Angel

It's not often that I have to take a break from a book, but I needed three days off from page after page of purple prose about people neither pleasant nor entertaining nor interesting.

Wolfe's 1929 Bildungsroman, a coming of age in North Carolina novel, was once thought to put Wolfe on a level with Hemingway or Faulkner.

Not many critics would hold him in such esteem today; I believe this revaluation is well deserved. Wolfe never used one word when he could cram in ten, preferably with much "poetic" diction and overuse of alliteration. Not every writer has to write the stripped down prose of Hemingway, not every darling has to be murdered, but an editorial slaughter would have been welcome here.* Wolfe also lacks the insight and imagination exercised by Faulkner with regard to race in the South.

Getting to the last of the 500 plus pages of wordy self indulgence this afternoon felt like the end of an ordeal.

Am I being unfair? Wolfe is sometimes described as an author best appreciated by young men. I admit that I might well have been impressed had I read him as an adolescent; I'm glad I did not, as the book might have done irreparable damage to my prose style.

#Books #ThomasWolfe #LookHomewardAngel #USLiterature #AmericanLiterature #20thCenturyLiterature #NorthCarolina #Bildungsroman

Thomas Wolfe -- Look Homeward, Angel

It's not often that I have to take a break from a book, but I needed three days off from page after page of purple prose about people neither pleasant nor entertaining nor interesting.

Wolfe's 1929 Bildungsroman, a coming of age in North Carolina novel, was once thought to put Wolfe on a level with Hemingway or Faulkner.

Not many critics would hold him in such esteem today; I believe this revaluation is well deserved. Wolfe never used one word when he could cram in ten, preferably with much "poetic" diction and overuse of alliteration. Not every writer has to write the stripped down prose of Hemingway, not every darling has to be murdered, but an editorial slaughter would have been welcome here.* Wolfe also lacks the insight and imagination exercised by Faulkner with regard to race in the South.

Getting to the last of the 500 plus pages of wordy self indulgence this afternoon felt like the end of an ordeal.

Am I being unfair? Wolfe is sometimes described as an author best appreciated by young men. I admit that I might well have been impressed had I read him as an adolescent; I'm glad I did not, as the book might have done irreparable damage to my prose style.

#Books #ThomasWolfe #LookHomewardAngel #USLiterature #AmericanLiterature #20thCenturyLiterature #NorthCarolina #Bildungsroman

Thomas Wolfe -- Look Homeward, Angel

It's not often that I have to take a break from a book, but I needed three days off from page after page of purple prose about people neither pleasant nor entertaining nor interesting.

Wolfe's 1929 Bildungsroman, a coming of age in North Carolina novel, was once thought to put Wolfe on a level with Hemingway or Faulkner.

Not many critics would hold him in such esteem today; I believe this revaluation is well deserved. Wolfe never used one word when he could cram in ten, preferably with much "poetic" diction and overuse of alliteration. Not every writer has to write the stripped down prose of Hemingway, not every darling has to be murdered, but an editorial slaughter would have been welcome here.* Wolfe also lacks the insight and imagination exercised by Faulkner with regard to race in the South.

Getting to the last of the 500 plus pages of wordy self indulgence this afternoon felt like the end of an ordeal.

Am I being unfair? Wolfe is sometimes described as an author best appreciated by young men. I admit that I might well have been impressed had I read him as an adolescent; I'm glad I did not, as the book might have done irreparable damage to my prose style.

#Books #ThomasWolfe #LookHomewardAngel #USLiterature #AmericanLiterature #20thCenturyLiterature #NorthCarolina #Bildungsroman

@girlbandgeek

I don't want to flood your inbox, but I did want to thank you again for the Barbara Kingsolver recommendation.

I have just finished "The Bean Trees", which made a delightfully refreshing contrast to the last novel by a US author I read, Elmore Leonard's "Out of Sight"; see my comments on Leonard here: https://c.im/@jemmesedi/115323499218156545

Even though "The Bean Trees" was published 37 years ago in 1988 -- the year that Trump really started Trumping -- I was pleasantly reminded as I read it of how the USA is so much more than the simplistic caricature of a country presented by MAGA. The book conveys a vivid sense of various US places - Kentucky, Oklahoma, Arizona -- and the diversity of these places' inhabitants. I also found it refreshing to read a novel steeped in progressive values that was without a trace of the graduate seminar room or East/West coast hipsterism. I liked the way that Kingsolver incorporated surprises in the narrative and humour too; I laughed out loud at times. All in all, an enjoyable but also thought provoking read.

I think I'm going to put "The Poisonwood Bible" on my TBR list.

Thanks again - should I be thanking Dawn too?

#BarbaraKingsolver #Books #USLiterature #AmericanLiterature #TheBeanTrees #Fiction #Novels #LiteratureInEnglish

I recently read a couple of Elmore Leonard crime novels -- "Riding the Rap" and "Out of Sight".

I don't read that much contemporary fiction, nor do I have a deep background in crime fiction as a genre, so you'll have to make do with the remarks of a relatively ill informed reader.

I can see why Leonard is a both popular and respected writer. He knows how to structure a gripping narrative, and his dialogue rings true.

On a more critical note, I can imagine these two novels providing future students of US culture with material for a study of the anxieties and aspirations of middle class white men in an America seemingly riven with disorder.

In "Riding the Rap", Leonard's background as a writer of westerns comes across; the US marshal protagonist brings order to a lawless frontier by acting on his own initiative rather than a mere agent of a federal bureaucracy. Here though, the frontier is no longer in the west, but in Florida, and the threatening nonwhite others are no longer American Indians but a Puerto Rican hitman and a Black Bahamian immigrant who, as part of his assimilation to Black America, adopted an Islamic name.

Leonard's depiction of racial attitudes intersects with his representation of socioeconomic class distinctions. The two nonwhite criminals act for a while as henchmen to a drink and drug addled wealthy white playboy, whose kidnapping plan drives the plot forward. His exploitation of his senile mother's wealth and the revelation of her ugly racist attitudes point to the class and status tensions that exist between a decadent white upper class and the Appalachian coalmining heritage of the US marshal protagonist.

These racial and white populist themes recur in "Out of Sight", where middle aged, middle class, white bank robbers are contrasted with African American home invaders, the latter being characterized by their cruelty, treachery, idleness, lust, and greed.

In both novels the middle aged male protagonist beds a much younger female character; some readers might find these glimpses of the fantasy life of ageing men unintentionally ludicrous.

I think I'll reserve final judgment on Leonard until I've read another of his books. "Swag" is supposed to be good, but neither my local second bookstore nor my libraries have it available at the moment, and I don't want to pay full price for it.

#Books #ElmoreLeonard #USLiterature #CrimeFiction #RidingTheRap #OutOfSight #Race #Racism #Populism #USCulture

Renata Adler's 1976 novel "Speedboat" enjoys a cult following amongst MFA types.

I'm not an MFA type myself, but I thought I should give it a try.

If you're looking for a gripping story, this is not the book for you. It's virtually plotless, being composed of a series of episodes, observations, and micronarratives in the life of a young NYC based journalist. Certain characters recur, but the chronology is left unclear.

One does get a feel for New York in the seventies as experienced by a fairly privileged young white woman -- Elaine's, rats, vagrants in the apartment house vestibule, no show faculty at the state university,....At times, I found myself laughing at scenes from parties and metropolitan encounters.

I wonder if this would be good novel to study if one wanted to broaden one's understanding of the meaning of literary postmodernism. "Speedboat" exemplifies a formal experimentation distinctive from that of the modernist novel of the the first half of the twentieth century but which is also free of the metafictionality and self reference that often are taken as definitive of the postmodern.

#RenataAdler #Speedboat #USLiterature #Books #Fiction #LiteratureInEnglish

I recently read Tillie Olsen's 1960 novella "Tell Me a Riddle".

An aging Jewish woman with cancer, her sense of having lost her self through years of tending to others, endless arguments between spouses, poverty, death...it all sounds so bleak, doesn't it?

Yet such is Olsen's sensitivity to the sound of speech, the complex intertwining of resentment and attachment, memories of migration and hope, and sheer emotional honesty that I put down the book feeling revitalised.

Don't approach the book as "just" a piece of women's literature, working class writing, or Jewish literature; it's all of those, and (not "but") from these skeins Olsen weaves a tale for us all.

#USLiterature #AmericanLiterature #LiteratureInEnglish #FeministLiterature #WorkingClassLiterature #TwentiethCenturyLiterature #JewishLiterature #Novella #TillieOlsen #TellMeARiddle

"Walden, A Game" is a first-person simulation of the life of American philosopher Henry David Thoreau during his experiment in self-reliant living at Walden Pond in 1845. Players experience reflective play as they experience living in nature over the course of a New England year.

Get our free lesson plans for teaching Art, Art History, English Language Arts, Environmental Science, Math, Media Literacy, Science US History and Visual Arts. For grades 9-12.

https://journeysinfilm.org/product/walden/

@edutooters @education @edtechoutlaws @gaming #Education #Edutotooters #EdTech #Homeschooling #Parenting #History #Histodons #STEAM #LessonPlans #USLiterature #Literature #Thoreau #HenryDavidThoreau #Walden

I recently enjoyed Edith Wharton's "The Custom of the Country". With its settings in the US and France, this 1913 work bears some thematic resemblance to the international novels of Henry James. Wharton's work, though, does not foreshadow the modernist use of stream of consciousness as does the later work of James; stylistically, Wharton is working with in the tradition of realism, so that one can associate her with William Dean Howells as much as with James.

Writing in this realist tradition and, as one might expect from the author of a pioneering work on interior decoration, scrutinizing in detail dwellings and their contents, Wharton narrates the merciless struggle of midwestern transplant to New York Undine Spragg for upward social mobility. Architecture, furnishings, decor, dress, and accessories not only reflect social and psychological states but also serve to pivot the plot.

I suspect Americans and Europeans, men and women, and young and old will react variously to the novel. I was impressed by its shrewd observation of manners and mores, impressed by its wit and irony, and gripped by the narrative of the odious protagonist's irrepressible social ascent. I remember reading somewhere that "Downton Abbey" creator and beneficiary of a Conservative title hand-out Julian Fellowes was rooting for Undine all the way; that tells us as much about Tory peers as Wharton's work.

I bought the Penguin Classics edition, pictured in this post. I recommend purchasing another edition, as pages fell out of this brand new book as if it were a cheap pulp paperback of old. What a disappointment!

#TheCustomOfTheCountry #EdithWharton #Realism #Books #AmericanLiterature #USLiterature #Novels #Bookstodon #LiteratureInEnglish #PenguinBooks
#InternationalNovels

Speaking of Fitzgerald, here is a link to one of his finest short stories, "Babylon Revisited":

https://gutenberg.net.au/fsf/BABYLON-REVISITED.html

#FScottFitzgerald
#Fitzgerald
#USLiterature
#Books
#Bookstodon
#ShortStories #BabylonRevisited #Bookstodon
#20thCenturyLiterature
#AmericanLiterature
#20thCenturyLiterature
#AmericanLiterature

Purge your mind of jazz age cliches and then reread...

https://www.newstatesman.com/culture/books/2025/01/how-we-misread-the-great-gatsby

#TheGreatGatsby #FScottFitzgerald #Fitzgerald #USLiterature #Books #Bookstodon #20thCenturyLiterature #1920s #AmericanLiterature

I can't believe it was 12 years ago that Chris Looby and I edited American Literature's Aesthetic Dimensions. The essays really hold up -- Eric Lott on the #Carpenters, Trish Loughran on #Melville, to name just two of the many excellent contributions. On December 2, #Columbia UP is having a 50% sale on all books (discount code CYBER) , including mine and Chris's, and 70% on selected others (discount code 70OFF).

Check out Columbia's terrific list!

#Bookstodon
#USLiterature
#Litstudies

I can't believe it was 12 years ago that Chris Looby and I edited American Literature's Aesthetic Dimensions. The essays really hold up -- Eric Lott on the #Carpenters, Trish Loughran on #Melville, to name just two of the many excellent contributions. On December 2, #Columbia UP is having a 50% sale on all books (discount code CYBER) , including mine and Chris's, and 70% on selected others (discount code 70OFF).

Check out Columbia's terrific list!

#Bookstodon
#USLiterature
#Litstudies

I can't believe it was 12 years ago that Chris Looby and I edited American Literature's Aesthetic Dimensions. The essays really hold up -- Eric Lott on the #Carpenters, Trish Loughran on #Melville, to name just two of the many excellent contributions. On December 2, Columbia UP is having a 50% sale on all books (discount code CYBER) , including mine and Chris's, and 70% on selected others (discount code 70OFF).

Check out Columbia's terrific list!

#Bookstodon
#USLiterature
#Litstudies

I can't believe it was 12 years ago that Chris Looby and I edited American Literature's Aesthetic Dimensions. The essays really hold up -- Eric Lott on the #Carpenters, Trish Loughran on #Melville, to name just two of the many excellent contributions. On December 2, Columbia UP is having a 50% sale on all books (discount code CYBER) , including mine and Chris's, and 70% on selected others (discount code 70OFF).

Check out Columbia's terrific list!

#Bookstodon
#USLiterature
#Litstudies

Sinclair Lewis is one of my favourite American authors.

His novels are not only of historical interest, for they still offer valuable insights into the culture of the USA today.

I would particularly recommend the 1925 "Arrowsmith" to any student or worker in medicine or the life sciences.

#USLiterature #SinclairLewis #Arrowsmith

These #paperbacks arrived today! They're both about #time in #USliterature. My monograph starts w/#CharlesBrockdenBrown and ends w/#EdwardP.Jones. W/chapters in between on #Poe, #ElizabethStuartPhelps, and #Dreiser. A different through-line, to be sure. The #edited volume has outstanding chapters by many of the best #literarycritics. #Looby on #Tucker's The Partisan Leader, #Goble on #DeLillo, #Spires on #Black serial fiction, #Hale on #Faulkner. And more. Cost w/CUP discount, ~23.00 each.