J. D. Salinger was an author in 1951 when he published "The Catcher in the Rye." Is he one now? Was Henry Roth an author during the sixty years that separated "Call It Sleep," his literary debut, from his second novel, "Mercy of a Rude Stream?" To show us how silence can be produced and consumed as a literary text, Myles Weber takes a provocative look at four revered authors who battled writer s block or simply ceased publishing. The careers of Tillie Olsen, Henry Roth, J. D. Salinger, and Ralph Ellison suggest that an unproductive twentieth-century author could command serious critical...

J. D. Salinger was an author in 1951 when he published "The Catcher in the Rye." Is he one now? Was Henry Roth an author during the sixty years that separated "Call It Sleep," his literary debut, from his second novel, "Mercy of a Rude Stream?" To show us how silence can be produced and consumed as a literary text, Myles Weber takes a provocative look at four revered authors who battled writer s block or simply ceased publishing. The careers of Tillie Olsen, Henry Roth, J. D. Salinger, and Ralph Ellison suggest that an unproductive twentieth-century author could command serious critical...