Reminiscence and Re-creation in Contemporary American Fiction

Post-modernist fiction apparently presents a world of chance and randomness, devoid of historical intelligibility. Focusing on American post-modernist writers, Stacey Olster offers a challenge to this perception, showing how the experience of political and historical events has shaped the novelist's perspective. Communism after World War II proved particularly instrumental in this capacity; the failure of the Communist ideal in Russia forced a change in the literary perspective of history during the 1950s. Olster analyzes in detail historical narrative configurations in the works of a pivotal group of writers. Norman Mailer, Thomas Pynchon, John Barth, Robert Coover and E. L. Doctorow share a common vision of historical movement in the shape of an open-ended spiral. The modes of temporal movement constructed by these authors manage to recall an early Puritan prototype while remaining nonapocalyptic in direction.

"...Olster's study deserves to be praised for its clarity and precision." Michael Trussler, The Journal of American History

"In an excellent critical study of the relationship between American literature and American history, Stacey Olster offers an illuminating apologia for American post-modernist writers...Olster's argument is thought-provoking, written in lively and clear prose, and is impressively well-researched and documented." American Literature

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Reminiscence and Re-creation in Contemporary American Fiction

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Contents

Frontmatter
pp i-vi

Contents
pp vii-viii

Preface
pp ix-xii

Key to Abbreviations
pp xiii-xiv

Reminiscence and Re-Creation in Contemporary American Fiction
pp xv-xvi

Introduction
pp 1-12

1 - A Disruption of Sensibility
pp 13-35

2 - The Transition to Post-Modernism: Norman Mailer and a New Frontier in Fiction
pp 36-71

3 - Thomas Pynchon: An Interface of History and Science
pp 72-105

4 - John Barth: Clio as Kin to Calliope
pp 106-136

Conclusion: “Subjective Historicism”
pp 137-152

Notes
pp 153-171

Bibliography
pp 172-202

Index
pp 203-214

PERMISSIONS
pp 215-215

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Reminiscence and Re-creation in Contemporary American Fiction

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