American literature is no longer the refuge of the solitary hero. Like the society it mirrors, it is now a far richer, many-faceted explication of a complicated and diverse society—racially, culturally, and ethnically interwoven and at the same time fractured and fractious. Ten women writing fiction in America today—Toni Cade Bambara, Joan Didion, Louise Erdrich, Gail Godwin, Mary Gordon, Alison Lurie, Joyce Carol Oates, Jayne Anne Phillips, Susan Fromberg Schaeffer, and Mary Lee Settle—represent that geographic, ethnic, and racial diversity that is distinctively American. Their differing perspectives on literature and the American experience have produced Erdrich's stolid North Dakota plainswomen; Didion's sun-baked dreamers and screamers; the urban ethnics—Irish, Jewish, and black—of Gordon, Schaeffer, and Bambara; Oates's small-town, often violent, neurotics; Lurie's intellectual sophisticates; and the southern survivors and victims, male and female, of Phillips, Settle, and Godwin. The ten original essays in this collection focus on the traditional themes of identity, memory, family, and enclosure that pervade the fiction of these writers. The fictional women who emerge here, as these critics show, are often caught in the interwoven strands of memory, perceive literal and emotional space as entrapping, find identity elusive and frustrating, and experience the interweaving of silence, solitude, and family in complex patterns. Each essay in this collection is followed by bibliographies of works by and about the writer in question that will be invaluable resources for scholars and general readers alike. Here is a readable critical discussion of ten important contemporary novelists who have broadened the pages of American literature to reflect more clearly the people we are.

Reader's Guide Literature in English provides expert guidance to, and critical analysis of, the vast number of books available within the subject of English literature, from Anglo-Saxon times to the current American, British and Commonwealth scene. It is designed to help students, teachers and librarians choose the most appropriate books for research and study.

These twenty-five interviews with Joyce Carol Oates from early in her career to the present are the first such collection to be published. In these conversations from sources as diverse as major news magazines and small scholarly journals, Oates candidly talks about her work, her concepts of literature, her methods of writing, and many other topics. Throughout this anthology, Oates discusses how her writing paints a modern panorama of American life. Oates described her vast canvas to an interviewer: ""I could not take the time to write about a group of people who did not represent, in their various struggles, fantasies, unusual experiences, hopes, etc., our society in miniature."" She also comments upon her responsibility as an artist ""to bear witness"" to certain aspects of society. In this light, she responds to criticisms that violence seems to dominate her work by noting that ""one simply cannot know strengths unless suffering, misfortune, and violence are explored quite frankly by the writer.""In addition to discussing her works---from her first book By the North Gate (1963) to her most popular novel You Must Remember This (1987)---this prolific writer also answers questions about her writing habits. These interviews, spanning nineteen years, reveal a vivid portrait of Joyce Carol Oates writing as the conscience of society, as the creator of memorable prose and poetry, and as the artist deeply committed to a unique vision.

A Study Guide for Joyce Carol Oates's "Stalking," excerpted from Gale's acclaimed Short Stories for Students. This concise study guide includes plot summary; character analysis; author biography; study questions; historical context; suggestions for further reading; and much more. For any literature project, trust Short Stories for Students for all of your research needs.

A Study Guide for Joyce Carol Oates's "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?," excerpted from Gale's acclaimed Short Stories for Students. This concise study guide includes plot summary; character analysis; author biography; study questions; historical context; suggestions for further reading; and much more. For any literature project, trust Short Stories for Students for all of your research needs.

In The Program Era, Mark McGurl offers a fundamental reinterpretation of postwar American fiction, asserting that it can be properly understood only in relation to the rise of mass higher education and the creative writing program. McGurl asks both how the patronage of the university has reorganized American literature and—even more important—how the increasing intimacy of writing and schooling can be brought to bear on a reading of this literature. McGurl argues that far from occasioning a decline in the quality or interest of American writing, the rise of the creative writing program has instead generated a complex and evolving constellation of aesthetic problems that have been explored with energy and at times brilliance by authors ranging from Flannery O’Connor to Vladimir Nabokov, Philip Roth, Raymond Carver, Joyce Carol Oates, and Toni Morrison. Through transformative readings of these and many other writers, The Program Era becomes a meditation on systematic creativity—an idea that until recently would have seemed a contradiction in terms, but which in our time has become central to cultural production both within and beyond the university. An engaging and stylishly written examination of an era we thought we knew, The Program Era will be at the center of debates about postwar literature and culture for years to come.

A scholarly exploration of Elmore Leonard—provides original essays and fresh insights on the author’s works and influence Labelled as "the closest thing America has to a national novelist," Elmore Leonard's clean and direct writing, engaging bad guys, and deadpan humor resonate with readers around the nation and throughout the world. Popular films based on his books continue to introduce new audiences to Leonard's unique way of engaging with complex themes of American culture and pop-culture history. Yet surprisingly, academic treatments of his writing are almost nonexistent. Critical Essays on Elmore Leonard is an original anthology that covers the topics, themes, literary and narrative style, and enduring influences of one of the finest crime writers in the history of the genre. This unique collection of essays explores the ways in which Leonard’s work reflects America's dynamic, ever-changing culture. Divided into two parts, the book first examines major themes and topics in Leonard's works, followed by detailed case studies of five individual works including Get Shorty and Out of Sight. Essays discuss topics such as Leonard's skill at conveying sense of place, his use of dress and appearance in his crime fiction, the influence of romantic comedies and westerns on his writing, and the concepts of moral luck, determinism, and existentialism found in his novels. Unique and thoroughly original, this book: Covers Leonard's entire career, including his early Western novels and his work in visual media Illustrates Leonard's genius at handling free indirect discourse Discusses the author's influence, legacy, and contemporary relevance in various contexts Explores Leonard's success at making himself "invisible" in his own writing Includes an insightful introduction from the book's editor Critical Essays on Elmore Leonard is an ideal resource for academics and students in the field of genre studies, especially crime fiction, and general readers with interest in the subject.