John Irving

One of America's most noted contemporary novelists, John Irving has created a body of fiction of extraordinary range, moving with ease from romance to fairytale to thriller. Although his fiction follows in the tradition of the great 19th-century world novelists, he is a quintessential American writer--his novels are laced with broad humor, farce, and absurd situations. He does not hesitate to tackle the troubling issues that have faced our nation in the past few decades, such as war, racism, sexism, abortion, violence, and AIDS. This study offers a clear, accessible reading of Irving's fiction. It analyzes in turn all of his novels from Setting Free the Bears (1968) to his newest novel A Widow for One Year (1998). It also provides the reader with a complete bibliography of Irving's fiction, as well as selected reviews and criticism.

White men still hold most of the political and economic cards in the United States; yet stories about wounded and traumatized men dominate popular culture. Why are white men jumping on the victim bandwagon? Examining novels by Philip Roth, John Updike, James Dickey, John Irving, and Pat Conroy and such films as Deliverance, Misery, and Dead Poets Society -- as well as other writings, including The Closing of the American Mind -- Sally Robinson argues that white men are tempted by the possibilities of pain and the surprisingly pleasurable tensions that come from living in crisis.