Author Archive
The Contemporary Epic
I promised you Lonesome Dove, but we’re going to start with Derek Walcott’s Omeros, because this is a family of contemporary epics. Giant, sprawling books, full of gods and families, generations and cycles, books that seem like they go on forever and seem like they should. And where
Literary Enemies: Cormac McCarthy vs. Philip Roth
Disclaimer: These two writers are not actually enemies. As far as I know. In 2003, Harold Bloom wrote in the Boston Globe that there were only four great American novelists alive and working: Don DeLillo, Cormac McCarthy, Thomas Pynchon, and Philip Roth. I don’t agree. I think there were
The Five Families of Mob Literature
There aren’t many books that are the best. I have favorites; we all do. Awards committees and English departments do. There are classics and The Best American Short Stories and all the rest, but how many books can you say, without second-guessing yourself, without blushing or adding, “I think,”
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