Syncopations
Beats, New Yorkers, and Writers in the Dark
Format:Paperback
Publisher:University of California Press
Published:23rd May '08
Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back
This compulsively readable collection of profiles and essays by James Campbell, tied together by a beguiling autobiographical thread, proffers unique observations on writers and writing in the post-1950s period. Campbell considers writers associated with the "New Yorker" magazine, including John Updike, William Maxwell, Truman Capote, and Jonathan Franzen. Continuing his longterm engagement with African American authors, he offers an account of his legal battle with the FBI over James Baldwin's file and a new profile of Amiri Baraka. He also focuses on the Beat poets Gary Snyder and Allen Ginsberg, as well as writers such as Edmund White and Thom Gunn. Campbell's concluding essay on his childhood in Scotland gracefully connects the book's autobiographical dots.
"'Syncopations' should interest any observer of postwar American letters." -- Sam Munson New York Times Book Review "[Campbell's] best pieces deftly and economically capture the essence of their subjects, measuring the particular 'syncopations' that distinguish their work." -- Bharat Tandon Times Literary Supplement (TLS) "The object is neither to titillate nor to shock - though certain of Mr. Campbell's profiles do both - but to illumine. And this they accomplish splendidly." -- Eric Ormsby New York Sun
ISBN: 9780520252370
Dimensions: 229mm x 152mm x 15mm
Weight: 363g
251 pages