Sheer Fiction, Vol. 3 - Hardcover

Paul West

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0929701380 ISBN 13: 9780929701387

Publisher: McPherson, 1994

Synopsis

Paul West's nearly universal literary interests continue to be represented in this third gathering of the series: a baker's dozen of essays -- with such intriguing titles as "Remembrance of Things Proust," "Middle River Stump Jump," "A Vision of Bright Cannon-Fodder," "Tan Salaam and the Aga Khan," and "Thomas Mann, Englishman" -- along with an ample section of quick takes on Abish, Barth, Vollmann, Alvarez, Genet, Beckett, Lessing, Ghose, and some twenty more. As with his earlier volumes of Sheer Fiction, half the pleasure of reading West's belles lettres is the discovery of several writers' works you've never read, and which you're thereafter compelled to plunge into with abandon. The other half, of course, is the pleasure of reading a master stylist with language and wit at his complete command.

About this title

About the Author

British by birth, American for 40 years now, Mr. West has authored an array of imaginative novels -- including Rat Man of Paris, Lord Byron's Doctor, The Place in Flowers Where Pollen Rests, The Tent of Orange Mist -- along with such non-fiction works as My Father's War, A Stroke of Genius and Words for a Deaf Daughter. His reviews have appeared often in the pages of the New York Times and the Washington Post, and his essays in Harper's. He divides his time between Ithaca, New York and Palm Beach, Florida. He was one of the fiction judges of the 1990 National Book Award, and is the recipient of many prizes and awards.

From the Back Cover

We continue our presentation of Paul West's nearly universal literary interests with this third collection: a baker's dozen of essays -- with such intriguing titles as "Remembrance of Things Proust," "Middle River Stump Jump," "A Vision of Bright Cannon-Fodder," "Tan Salaam and the Aga Khan," and "Thomas Mann, Englishman" -- along with an ample section of quick takes on Abish, Barth, Vollmann, Alvarez, Genet, Beckett, Lessing, Ghose, and some twenty more. As with his earlier volumes of Sheer Fiction, half the pleasure of reading West's belles lettres is the discovery of several writers' works you've never read, and which you're thereafter compelled to plunge into with abandon. The other half, of course, is the pleasure of reading a master stylist with language and wit at his complete command.

Reviews

"Criticism, occupying time you might spend on the original text, should be at least as well-written as that text." Novelist and critic West ( Rat Man of Paris ), in his third volume of essays, continues to address the state of literature, past and present, with sophisticated literary showmanship. The articles and book reviews offered reflect West's sweeping knowledge and keen idiosyncratic mind. While several pieces deal with classic masters (Marcel Proust, Thomas Mann), West also concerns himself with contemporary writers (Milan Kundera, Doris Lessing), including some who stand at a distance from any canon (Anne Rice). Witty, opinionated and given to strategic descriptive flourishes, West dismisses the K-mart minimalism as "self-righteous plainness masquerading as austerity." He is deeply disturbed by the dehumanization that he feels is a result of modern warfare and reaches into nonfiction to discuss memoirs that have been written about the Nazi era (e.g., Letters to Freya 1939-1945 by Helmuth James von Moltke). "Whatever I am doing, my head is always kneading and rekneading givens. I hear voices," West explains by way of an ars critica . We're fortunate to overhear some of those voices.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Forget the title. The author of Love's Mansion (1992) and Lord Byron's Doctor (1989) puts his elegant and often acid pen to ruminations on subjects from television coverage of Desert Storm, which served up war as a "vicarious commodity," to the tabloids, whose very incredibility West relates to Latin American fabulism and the Greek tragedies. There's plenty of literary discourse, of course, as West looks at--and sometimes picks apart--the fiction of Thomas Mann, Doris Lessing, Walter Abish, John Barth, Samuel Beckett, and numerous others. Unhappy with Jean Genet's PLO affiliation, West scores the controversial Frenchman's nonfiction as "elliptical graffiti done in the washrooms of history." On William T. Vollman, he mixes praise with a faint damn, noting that the young writer "excels at babble and lyrical, sharp-edged interruptions." There's an extraordinary piece on West's controversial stint as a judge for the 1991 National Book Award (the entrants shared a "barbarous monotony"); a lovely "Remembrance of Things Proust"; and a brilliantly simplistic exploration of "Where Novels Come From." Difficult, acerbic at times, and sometimes just plain grouchy, West's penetrating essays command both attention and admiration without begging concurrence. Ron Antonucci

West is a literary and cultural critic of extraordinary skill, as evidenced in his earlier volumes of criticism (Vol. 1, LJ 6/1/87; Vol. 2, LJ 2/1/91). In this latest work he has added essays on war, again written with uncommon skill. He penetrates the usual rhetoric by noting, "We will never understand war, or TV, until we are watching ourselves being bombed this very minute, here in America, home of the safe." Devotees of exceptional writing will find the keenest comfort in West's views on Proust ("swing with him"), Mann ("an inexhaustible object of contemplation"), and several famous others. West also assays others who are not so well known but hones his criticism of them with such artistry that each becomes a writer that must be read. In an essay entitled "Judge Not," West writes, "All I ask for is excellence." That he certainly has. Well recommended for literature collections.
Robert L. Kelly, Fort Wayne Community Schs., Ind.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: McPherson
• Publication date: 1994
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0929701380
• ISBN 13: 9780929701387
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 216