The Cambridge Companion to American Novelists

Author(s): Timothy Parrish

Literary Studies

This Companion examines the full range and vigor of the American novel. From the American exceptionalism of James Fenimore Cooper to the apocalyptic post-Americanism of Cormac McCarthy, these newly commissioned essays from leading scholars and critics chronicle the major aesthetic innovations that have shaped the American novel over the past two centuries. The essays evaluate the work, life and legacy of influential American novelists including Melville, Twain, James, Wharton, Cather, Faulkner, Ellison, Pynchon and Morrison, while situating them within the context of their literary predecessors and successors. The volume also highlights less familiar, though equally significant writers such as Theodore Dreiser and Djuna Barnes, providing a balanced and wide-ranging survey of use to students, teachers and general readers of American literature.


Product Information

Timothy Parrish is Professor of English at Florida State University. Publishing widely on American literature and culture, he is the author of three books, including Ralph Ellison and the Genius of America (2012). He is editor of The Cambridge Companion to Philip Roth (2007).

Introduction Timothy Parrish; 1. James Fenimore Cooper Stephen Railton; 2. Nathaniel Hawthorne Robert Milder; 3. Herman Melville Clark Davis; 4. Harriet Beecher Stowe Arthur Riss; 5. Mark Twain Peter Messent; 6. Henry James Thomas J. Otten; 7. Edith Wharton Pamela Knights; 8. Theodore Dreiser Clare Eby; 9. Willa Cather Timothy Parrish; 10. F. Scott Fitzgerald Ruth Prigozy; 11. Ernest Hemingway Eugene Goodheart; 12. William Faulkner Philip Weinstein; 13. Henry Roth Hana Wirth-Nesher; 14. Djuna Barnes Alex Goody; 15. Zora Neale Hurston Lovalerie King; 16. Richard Wright William Dow; 17. Raymond Chandler Leonard Cassuto; 18. Ralph Ellison David Yaffe; 19. J. D. Salinger Sarah Graham; 20. Patricia Highsmith Joan Schenkar; 21. Vladimir Nabokov Julian W. Connoly; 22. Jack Kerouac Joshua Kupetz; 23. Saul Bellow Victoria Aarons; 24. Kurt Vonnegut Todd Davis; 25. John Updike James Schiff; 26. Thomas Pynchon David Seed; 27. Toni Morrison Valerie Smith; 28. Philip Roth Debra Shostak; 29. Don DeLillo Thomas Heise; 30. Cormac McCarthy Brian Evenson; Guide to further reading; Index.

General Fields

  • : 9781107600973
  • : Cambridge University Press
  • : Cambridge University Press
  • : 31 October 2012
  • : 228mm X 152mm
  • : 01 February 2013
  • : books

Special Fields

  • : Timothy Parrish
  • : Paperback
  • : 385