My2cents
12-28-2010, 02:03 PM
I heard about this book through NPR.
It's about a graduate writing program; the harsh, talented instructor teaching it; and three of her students. Most of the story is filtered through one of the students who has an affair with the instructor by which he launches a brilliant literary/academic career.
At the point when the affair becomes an accomplished fact, I groaned, thinking "Isn't this getting old? What more drama can be squeezed out of this likely scenario?"
Fortunately, the quality of the prose, which reminded me of Delillo (sharp and precise like cut glass), kept me absorbed when the underlying theme of the book became apparent: What is the relationship, if any, between literary success and artistic merit? or Is literary success more contingent on who we know than the quiddity of the composition itself?
Those are the questions the author dangles in front of the reader and I, for one, am glad that I took the bait.
It's about a graduate writing program; the harsh, talented instructor teaching it; and three of her students. Most of the story is filtered through one of the students who has an affair with the instructor by which he launches a brilliant literary/academic career.
At the point when the affair becomes an accomplished fact, I groaned, thinking "Isn't this getting old? What more drama can be squeezed out of this likely scenario?"
Fortunately, the quality of the prose, which reminded me of Delillo (sharp and precise like cut glass), kept me absorbed when the underlying theme of the book became apparent: What is the relationship, if any, between literary success and artistic merit? or Is literary success more contingent on who we know than the quiddity of the composition itself?
Those are the questions the author dangles in front of the reader and I, for one, am glad that I took the bait.