Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
American Classics: A Personal Essay

American Classics: A Personal Essay

Donoghue, Denis

Hardcover

Literary Criticism

ISBN10: 0300107811
ISBN13: 9780300107814
Publisher: Yale University Press
Published: Dec 11 2003
Pages: 304
Weight: 0.98
Height: 1.08 Width: 5.82 Depth: 8.48
Language: English
An eminent literary critic explores five American classics

How is a classic book to be defined? How much time must elapse before a work may be judged a classic? And among all the works of American literature, which deserve the designation? In this provocative new book, Denis Donoghue answers these questions. He presents his own short list of relative classics, works whose appeal may not be universal but which nonetheless have occupied an important place in our culture for more than a century. These books have survived the abuses of time--neglect, contempt, indifference, willful readings, excesses of praise, and hyperbole.

Donoghue bestows the term classic on just five American works: Melville's Moby-Dick, Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, Thoreau's Walden, Whitman's Leaves of Grass, and Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

Examining each in individual chapters, he discusses how the writings have been received and interpreted, and he offers his own contemporary readings, suggesting, for example, that in the post-9/11 era, Moby-Dick may be rewardingly read as a revenge tragedy. Donoghue extends an irresistible invitation to open the pages of these American classics again, demonstrating with wit and acuity how very much they have to say to us now.

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