A review by ilchinealach
The Program Era: Postwar Fiction and the Rise of Creative Writing by Mark McGurl
3.0
the first eighty pages of this are great and everyone even slightly interested in modernism and its legacy should read it. mcgurl's central insight that universities, in their role in training, professionalising and hiring readers/writers are the primary focal point for the production and re-production of literary value and prestige is pretty bang on and i'd love to see it explored further outside of the american context
from page eighty onwards mcgurl is getting more into his case studies, so close readings of the careers of flannery o'connor, ken kesey, barthelme especially as these crossed over with the actual creative writing workshops in question and i didn't find a huge amount of interest here, a lot of the promise contained in the original historical sweep gets left behind a bit
from page eighty onwards mcgurl is getting more into his case studies, so close readings of the careers of flannery o'connor, ken kesey, barthelme especially as these crossed over with the actual creative writing workshops in question and i didn't find a huge amount of interest here, a lot of the promise contained in the original historical sweep gets left behind a bit