Pynchon's Against the Day
A Corrupted Pilgrim's Guide
By (author) Jeffrey Severs, Christopher Leise Contributions by Graham Benton, Christopher K. Coffman Boston University, Inger H. Dalsgaard, Amy J. Elias, Kathryn Hume, Martin Kevorkian, Brian McHale Distinguished Arts and Humanities Professor at The Ohio State University, A, Elisabeth McKetta, J Paul Narkunas, Krzysztof Piekarski, Terry Reilly, Justin St. Clair
Publication date:
24 February 2011Length of book:
320 pagesPublisher
University of Delaware PressDimensions:
238x163mm6x9"
ISBN-13: 9781611490640
Thomas Pynchon's longest novel to date, Against the Day (2006), excited diverse and energetic opinions when it appeared on bookstore shelves nine years after the critically acclaimed Mason & Dixon. Its wide-ranging plot covers nearly three decades—from the 1893 World's Fair to the years just after World War I—and follows hundreds of characters within its 1085 pages. The book’s eleven essays by established luminaries and emerging voices in the field of Pynchon criticism, address a significant aspect of the novel's manifold interests. By focusing on three major thematic trajectories (the novel's narrative strategies; its commentary on science, belief, and faith; and its views on politics and economics), the contributors contend that Against the Day is not only a major addition to Pynchon's already impressive body of work, but also a defining moment in the emergence of twenty-first century American literature.