A Reader's Manifesto

A Reader's Manifesto: An Attack on the Growing Pretentiousness in American Literary Prose by B.R. Myers

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Of course I enjoy reading a well-written screed against contemporary fiction; I like anyone who agrees with me that the emperor has no clothes. Myers focuses all of his criticism on style, however; "these folks can't write!" he exclaims over and over. The examples he gives (from Proulx, Guterson, DeLillo, and Cormac McCarthy) are in fact terrible. It's refreshing to have this named in print. All the same, I wish he would have spent equal time offering examples (from past or contemporary writers) of model sentences. I'd appreciate some effort to uplift the state of literature rather than just bad-mouth it.



What I'm waiting for is a screed that names contemporary fiction's inability to address the human condition in ways that illuminate it or uplift it. And offers corrective suggestions.



View all my reviews