Literary Criticism and Reviews: Other Authors
In a way, the term “Other Authors” here makes me cringe a little.
Willa Cather, for example—about whose work I wrote the lead essay for the Winter 2000 issue of the journal pictured at right—is hardly merely an “other.” Yevgeny Zamyatin began the modern science-fictional dystopia with his wittily ironic and impressionistic novel We, and of course who has not heard of Aldous Huxley’s equally witty and equally bleak Brave New World? And in the field of science fiction, the famed Robert Silverberg is... Well, you see what I mean. Oh, yes— And I guess it’s a tad odd to call Shakespeare an “other,” too, isn’t it...? Still, if I am to categorize my own writings, which contain so much on Heinlein and Bradbury, this seems about the only way. My chapter in M. Keith Booker’s Critical Insights: Dystopia is listed again here, by the way, because it actually discusses 1984 and Brave New World rather more than it does Fahrenheit 451—similar deal with my chapter comparing Heinlein’s Tunnel in the Sky and Golding’s Lord of the Flies and the one comparing Heinlein’s Tunnel Have Space Suit—Will Travel with Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood. |
In any event, as always, most of these articles are available through the online literary research databases to which libraries often subscribe, and for some I can provide links to full-text resources elsewhere online.
“ ‘There Must Be Something Wrong with Us’ Versus ‘A Black Widow Spider Can’t Help It—But That’s the Point’: Right and Wrong and Responsibility in In Cold Blood and Robert A. Heinlein’s Tunnel Have Space Suit—Will Travel.” Critical Insights: In Cold Blood, edited by Nicolas Tredell, Salem, 2020, pp. 135-50. |
“Harper Lee.” Great Lives from History: American Women vol. 2, edited by Mary K. Trigg, Salem, 2016, pp. 696-99.
“Around the World in Eighty Days—Jules Verne.” Recommended Reading: 600 Classics Reviewed, Salem, 2015, pp. 18-19.
“A Clockwork Orange—Anthony Burgess.” Recommended Reading: 600 Classics Reviewed, Salem, 2015, pp. 61.
“The Earthsea Trilogy--Ursula K. LeGuin.” Recommended Reading: 600 Classics Reviewed, Salem, 2015, pp. 90.
“The Hobbit—J.R.R. Tolkien.” Recommended Reading: 600 Classics Reviewed, Salem, 2015, pp. 141-42.
“The Left Hand of Darkness—Ursula K. LeGuin.” Recommended Reading: 600 Classics Reviewed, Salem, 2015, pp. 170-71.
“Silent Spring—Rachel Carson.” Recommended Reading: 600 Classics Reviewed, Salem, 2015, p. 294.
“A Clockwork Orange—Anthony Burgess.” Recommended Reading: 600 Classics Reviewed, Salem, 2015, pp. 61.
“The Earthsea Trilogy--Ursula K. LeGuin.” Recommended Reading: 600 Classics Reviewed, Salem, 2015, pp. 90.
“The Hobbit—J.R.R. Tolkien.” Recommended Reading: 600 Classics Reviewed, Salem, 2015, pp. 141-42.
“The Left Hand of Darkness—Ursula K. LeGuin.” Recommended Reading: 600 Classics Reviewed, Salem, 2015, pp. 170-71.
“Silent Spring—Rachel Carson.” Recommended Reading: 600 Classics Reviewed, Salem, 2015, p. 294.
“Familial Rights and Responsibilities in Romeo and Juliet and King Lear.” Critical Survey of Shakespeare's Plays, 2nd ed., edited by Joseph Rosenblum, Salem, 2015, pp. 69-77.
“A Guide to Free Online Resources on Shakespeare’s Plays.” Critical Survey of Shakespeare's Plays, 2nd ed., edited by Joseph Rosenblum, Salem, 2015, pp. 293-98.
“ ‘They Got Me a Long Time Ago’: The Sympathetic Villain in Nineteen Eighty-Four, Brave New World, and Fahrenheit 451.” Critical Insights: Dystopia, edited by M. Keith Booker, Salem, 2013, pp. 125-41. Listed in Meckier, Jerome. Aldous Huxley and Utopia, Verlag, 2022, p. 214. |
“From a ‘Stretch of Grey Sea’ to the ‘Extent of Space’: The Gaze across Vistas in Cather’s The Professor’s House.” Western American Literature vol. 34, Winter 2000, pp. 388-408. Cited in Russell, Danielle. Between the Angle and the Curve: Mapping Gender, Race, Space, and Identity in Willa Cather and Toni Morisson, Routledge, 2006, p. 199. Cited in Love, Glen A. “Nature and Human Nature: Interdisciplinary Convergences on Cather’s Blue Mesa.” Cather Studies 5: Willa Cather's Ecological Imagination, edited by Susan J. Rosowski, U of Nebraska P, 2003. |
Listed in Lindsay, Elizabeth Blakesley. “A Guide to Research: Willa Cather (1873-1947),” 2001. URL: http://www.womenwriters.net/domesticgoddess/catherguide.html.
“[Numbers and Meaning in] Zamyatin’s We” (with Bretton J. Dennis). The Explicator vol. 58, Summer 2000, pp. 211-13. Available online here. |
“[Images of Superficiality in] Olds’ ‘Sex Without Love.’ ” The Explicator vol. 58, Fall 1999, pp. 60-62. Available online here. Listed in Dictionary of World Biography: The 20th Century vol. VII, Go-N, 2014. n.p. Listed in Cucinelle, Catherine, editor. Contemporary American Women Poets: An A-to-Z Guide, Greenwood, 2002, p. 262. |
“[Names in] Huxley’s Brave New World.” The Explicator vol. 57, Fall 1998, pp.27-30. Available online here. Rpt. as “Literary and Political Allusions behind Huxley’s Choice of Names” in Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World, edited by Harold Bloom, Chelsea House, 2004, pp. 92-95. Cited in “Onomastic Satire: Names and Naming in Brave New World.” Aldous Huxley: Modern Satirical Novelist of Ideas, edited by Peter E. Firchow and Bernfried Nugel, Lit Verlag, 2006, p. 342. |
Cited in Abel, Corey. “The Politics of Love and Friendship: 1984 and Brave New World.” Love and Friendship: Rethinking Politics and Affection in Modern Times, edited by Eduardo A. Velasquez, Lexington, 2003, p. 472.
“ ‘A Relationship...More than Six Inches Deep’: Lust and Love in Silverberg’s Science Fiction.” Extrapolation vol. 39, Spring 1998, pp. 40-51. Available online here. Cited in Butler, Andrew M. Solar Flares: Science Fiction in the 1970s, Liverpool UP, 2012, p. 209. Cited in Chapman, Edgar L. The Road to Castle Mount: The Science Fiction of Robert Silverberg, Greenwood, 1999, p. 98. |
“[Social Disconnection in] Yellen’s ‘Nighthawks.’ ” The Explicator vol. 56, Spring 1998, pp. 148-49. Available online here. |
“Review of Richard D. Brown. The Strength of a People: The Idea of an Informed Citizenry in America, 1650-1870.” H-Review, H-Net Reviews (Michigan State University), February 1998, 28 pars. URL: http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showpdf.php?id=1692. |
“[The Patterns of] Lowell’s ‘Patterns.’ ” The Explicator vol. 55, Spring 1997, pp. 142-44. Available online here.
Available for rpt. in CourseReader: American Literature, Gale/Cengage, 2012. Cited in A Study Guide for Amy Lowell's "Patterns": Literary Themes for Students, Gale/Cengage, 2016, n.p. Listed in Dictionary of World Biography vol. 8: 20th Century, Go-N, edited by Frank N. Magill, Salem and Fitzroy, 1999, p. 2251. |
Pre-Publication Review
Howe, Elisabeth A. Close Reading: An Introduction to Literature. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Longman, 2010.
Roberts, Edgar V. Writing about Literature 12th ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Longman, 2010.
Roberts, Garyn G. The Prentice Hall Anthology of Science Fiction and Fantasy. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice, 2001.