The first comprehensive study to address Franzen's work to date, including his latest novel, Crossroads. Jonathan Franzen—novelist and essayist—is a critical darling, commercial success, and magnet for controversy. His third novel, The Corrections (2000), was selected for Oprah's book club, nominated for the Pulitzer Prize, and won the National Book Award. Franzen has been featured on the cover of Time and in an episode of The Simpsons. Love him or hate him, the publication of each new novel is a literary event. In Understanding Jonathan Franzen, Timothy Galow studies Franzen's first...

The first comprehensive study to address Franzen's work to date, including his latest novel, Crossroads. Jonathan Franzen—novelist and essayist—is a critical darling, commercial success, and magnet for controversy. His third novel, The Corrections (2000), was selected for Oprah's book club, nominated for the Pulitzer Prize, and won the National Book Award. Franzen has been featured on the cover of Time and in an episode of The Simpsons. Love him or hate him, the publication of each new novel is a literary event. In Understanding Jonathan Franzen, Timothy Galow studies Franzen's first...

An ideal introduction into the complex and compelling dramas of the acclaimed playwright Now available in a paperback edition and featuring a new preface, Understanding Sam Shepard investigates the notoriously complex dramatic world of Sam Shepard, one of America's most prolific, thoughtful, and challenging contemporary playwrights. During his nearly fifty-year career as a writer, actor, director, and producer, Shepard (1943-2017) consistently focused his work on the ever-changing American cultural landscape. James A. Crank's thorough study offers scholars and students of the dramatist a...

A new preface covers Mamet's most recent plays and nonfiction writingUnderstanding David Mamet analyzes the broad range of David Mamet's plays and places them in the context of his career as a prolific writer of fiction and nonfiction prose, as well as drama. In addition to playwriting and directing for the theater, Mamet also writes, directs, and produces for film and television, and he writes essays, fiction, poetry, and even children's books. Author Brenda Murphy centers her discussion around Mamet's most significant plays—Glengarry Glen Ross, Oleanna, American Buffalo, Speed-the-Plow,...

A fresh examination of Harper's body of work as an archive of Black life, thought, and culture.The first book devoted to the groundbreaking poet's work, Understanding Michael S. Harper locates his poetic project within Black expressive tradition. The study examines poems drawn from the eleven volumes of verse that Harper (1938-2016) produced between 1970 and 2010, bringing attention to his poetry's sustained engagement with music, literature, and the visual arts. Author Michael A. Antonucci offers readers an account of the poet's career while assessing his verse and providing a sense of its...

A fresh examination of Harper's body of work as an archive of Black life, thought, and culture.The first book devoted to the groundbreaking poet's work, Understanding Michael S. Harper locates his poetic project within Black expressive tradition. The study examines poems drawn from the eleven volumes of verse that Harper (1938-2016) produced between 1970 and 2010, bringing attention to his poetry's sustained engagement with music, literature, and the visual arts. Author Michael A. Antonucci offers readers an account of the poet's career while assessing his verse and providing a sense of its...