Greenwood A Sourcebook of American Literary Journalism: Representative Writers in an Emerging Genre

A wide range of writers are brought together for the first time in this discussion of an on-going, largely unrecognized American prose tradition: literary journalism of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Such writing was not new journalism and therefore simply a type of journalism; nor was it factual fiction, merely a type of realistic fiction. Rather, it can be examined as a distinct literary form, a type of cultural expression that can be defined and characterized. Thirty-five lively and literate essays by contributing scholars analyze major writers of this literary genre or writers known for a major work in the genre, and Thomas B. Connery provides short pieces for nineteen additional figures. The volume introduction discusses definitions and characteristics of literary journalism, with reference to the patterns of reality depicted, and identifies two main types: works characterized by immersion and shorter, more impressionistic pieces. The roots of this new journalism are traced, and ideas of the theorists of this genre are explicated. Connery also provides the results of his research and uncovers the primary sources of literary journalism. Review ?"Literary journalism" has been widely recognized as a genre since Tom Wolfe's description of the "new journalism" in 1973, although journalism using techniques of fiction has existed for far longer. In this critical work on American literary journalism, a brief introductory essay defines literary journalism and discusses both its history and prominent works of criticism. The remainder of the work is devoted to critical essays on individual American literary journalists, beginning in the late 19th century with Mark Twain and concluding with the present day. Essays on 34 authors were written by 32 contributors and average about 10 pages in length, concentrating primarily on each author's works of literary journalism, with very few references to biographical information. For major authors, including Mark Twain, Stephen Crane, and Norman Mailer, assessments of their contributions are limited to works only in this genre; thus the discussions are quite narrow in scope. More useful are essays that cover lesser known or contemporary figures about whom relatively little criticism is available, including such writers as Jacob A. Riis, Dorothy Day, George Ade, Bob Greene, Joe McGinniss, and Tracy Kidder. Accessible to undergraduates, lower-division and up.?-Choice ?Connery presents short biographical sketches of the hundreds of men and women who have shaped the news world in America from the late seventeenth century to the present.' The alphabetically arranged narrative entries, averaging from one to eight paragraphs in length, give dates for each journalist, places he or she lived and worked, and information about personality, special interests and career development. . . . An interesting introduction gives an overview of such aspects of the field as censorship, muckraking, women journalists, war correspondents, and the electronic age. A bibliography and a reliable index complete the book. The authors are noted librarians; the late Robert B. Downs was a former president of ALA. This book promises to be a useful reference source and would be a welcome addition to public and high school libraries. . . . While all these writers are treated in one of Gale's literary criticism series, this book's focus makes it unique. It belongs in academic libraries serving schools of journalism and studies in American literature, though it might be more usefully placed in the circulating collection.?-Booklist ?Literary criticism occupies a precarious position in reference collections. When emulsified with biography, as in Gale's Dictionary of Literary Biography (Detroit: Gale 1978--), it is welcome; when it stands alone, it is usually banished to the stacks. This latter fate, therefore, awaits the thirty-five insightful critical essays that analyze the work of literary jour