内容简介
A guide to America's literary tradition. Over 1,600 articles on writers, literary works, movements, and influential periodicals. More than 170 black-and-white photographs. The companion volume to C-Span's series American Writers: A Journey Through History.
编辑推荐
.com
Published in conjunction with C-SPAN's
American Writers series, this
Dictionary of American Writers features capsule biographies of more than 1,100 American writers. Among them are "numerous American Indians, former slaves, and immigrants from every corner of the earth." There are writers of fiction, poetry, drama, history, essays, diaries, philosophy, and even screenplays. While some of these write-ups (on Emily Dickinson, Benjamin Franklin, and William Dean Howells, for example) are longer, most are around 150 words (and adapted from
Merriam-Webster's Encyclopedia of Literature). You can't say a lot in 150 words. There are dates and places to fit in, as well as titles of major works, and, in some cases, pronunciations (though why there are five listed for John Brougham's surname eludes us). The biographical sketches are, in other words, sketchy. Still, the book starts in with Edward Abbey and doggedly charts a path all the way to Louis Zukofsky.
If you're looking for a little information about an awful lot of American writers, this will suit your needs just fine. And there are interesting tidbits throughout: lawyer Louis Auchincloss, we learn, managed to pen 50 books in part because he would take a writing notebook to court; Frances Hodgson Burnett paid for writing paper by "gathering and selling wild grapes"; and Mary Higgins Clark worked as a flight attendant. Also included are more than 500 entries on literary works, and over 75 on groups, movements, and periodicals that have helped shape "the character of American literature." --Jane Steinberg
专业书评
From Library Journal
the series' web site (www.americanwriters.org). The bulk of thework consists of 1000 biographical articles on influentialAmerican authors. Following is a section of briefer descriptiveentries on over 500 literary works, including important novels,poems, plays, essays, and histories. The dictionary ends with asection that lists and describes 75 of the groups, movements,and periodicals that have shaped American literature. Eachbiographical entry includes full name, pronunciation (ifnecessary), birth and death dates and places, and a one-linepr?cis of the importance of the subject, in addition to thebrief biographical article. Black-and-white thumbnail photos ofthe authors appear on alternating pages. As an accompaniment tothe television series, this is a wonderful book, to be used forreference and read for enrichment. But as a comprehensivebiographical dictionary for a library reference collection, itdoesn't quite fit the bill. In size, shape, and format, it islike the line of dependable biographical, geographical, andother dictionaries produced by Merriam-Webster, but unlike thoseworks, it is too selective. Benet's Reader's Encyclopedia ofAmerican Literature (LJ 1/92) is still a better choice at thereference desk. Nevertheless, this book will be handy for themillions of library patrons who will be watching C-SPAN'syear-long series. APaul D'Alessandro, Portland P.L., ME
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Booklist
Designed for the average reader as a companion volume to C-SPAN's 38-part series
American Writers: A Journey through History, this alphabetically arranged dictionary treats the -year literary history of the U.S., from the time of the earliest European colonists to the eve of the twenty-first century. Entries are arranged into three sections: "Authors," " Literary Works," and"Groups, Movements, and Periodicals."
The first section, by far the largest, with more than 1,000 entries, covers a wide range of authors, including novelists, poets, dramatists, historians, diarists, essayists, journalists, philosophers, and even screenwriters. Entries, generally a paragraph or two in length, contain biographical information and a listing of important works, some cross-referenced to entries in the "Literary Works" section. Twentieth-century authors predominate, but writers from other time periods are well represented. America's pluralism is reflected, although several omissions were noted, among them Denise Chavez, Michael Dorris, and David Henry Hwang.
Although fewer in number, the 500 entries of the "Literary Works" section are no less significant. They provide a brief publishing history, summary, and discussion of important poems, plays, novels, essays, autobiographies, short stories, and historical works. Coverage is thorough, except for the last category, which could have been enriched by the inclusion of the Declaration of Independence and Gettysburg Address. Excluded presumably because they are not considered literaryworks per se, their absence is surprising considering their routine appearance in many literary anthologies.
In "Groups, Movements, and Periodicals," readers can explore the evolving nature of the American tradition in 75 entries as
