February 2013Book I Bought In 2007 And Hadn't Read Yet (As Of January 2013) #1: The Public Burning by Robert Coover"Those who have cast their lot with me shall come to dominion! Those who have cast it with the Phantom shall get their ass stacked!"-Uncle Sam Mine eyes have seen the glory!1953, J...
This book has me in its grip.Reading The Recognitions is like wandering in a labyrinth, and around each corner there's a new revelation. One feels a little lost at times, but there are familiar sights. Can we trust our guide? Gaddis gives you the sense he knows the way...until he lets go of you...
more Gass. What can I say? For a while the only thing I could think of when I heard Rilke was Igby saying "Every year some asshole gives me a copy of Rilke's Letter To A Young Poet, telling me how it will change my life" or whatever. As independent and unaffected as I like to pretend I am, that l...
James Wood, critic and finger-drummer extraordinaire, nails the problem with Gass’s style in this quartet of novellas from 1998 (reprinted by Dalkey in 2009)—Gass stretches the credulity of his characters’ interior narration by bestowing them with the same stylish gifts as Gass the narrator. It d...
On Being Blue: A Philosophical Inquiry by William H. Gass is, well, a very innovative and enlightening piece of work. Mr. Gass redefines Philosophical Inquiry and in the process shames his equivalents. Actually, it is not a mere Philosophical Inquiry, it's also with a touch of Linguistic Analysis...