"I WAS NEVER MORE HATED THAN WHEN I TRIED TO TO HONEST" --Ralph Ellison

So much for The Great American Novel--Newsweek 2/15/10 p. 50

"Unfortunately, most of the writers who emulated Melville's ambition produced books that were not great but do resemble white whales...we see authors struggling to create masterpieces that on almost every page threaten to collapse under their own weight."

My! My! Such cynicism! Does Newsweek not know that every book advertised on the pages of TNY is a must-read? There must be thousands of grate(d) american novels by now...how to choose, how to choooose.............hm? Could the state of our states somehow resemble or even provoke the low estate of 21st century fiction; which in turn degradeth the state of, say, Nashville? Which was the first to collapse? Maybe it's like the Bubonic Plague: Ring around the rosy, pocket full of posies....

ALL FALLLL

DOWN