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Original Essays | November 9, 2009

Jesse Bullington: IMG Abash'd the Devil Stood



I don't believe in evil. It's a word I use, certainly, because words are shortcuts and we all take the short way round from time to time, but that's... Continue »
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A Death in the Family

by James Agee

A Death in the Family Cover

Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments:

Forty years after its original publication, James Agee's last novel seems, more than ever, an American classic. For in his lyrical, sorrowful account of a man's death and its impact on his family, Agee painstakingly created a small world of domestic happiness and then showed how quickly and casually it could be destroyed.

On a sultry summer night in 1915, Jay Follet leaves his house in Knoxville, Tennessee, to tend to his father, whom he believes is dying. The summons turns out to be a false alarm, but on his way back to his family, Jay has a car accident and is killed instantly. Dancing back and forth in time and braiding the viewpoints of Jay's wife, brother, and young son, Rufus, Agee creates an overwhelmingly powerful novel of innocence, tenderness, and loss that should be read aloud for the sheer music of its prose.

Review:

"An utterly individual and original book...one of the most deeply worked out expressions of human feeling that I have ever read." New York Times Book Review

Review:

"It is, in the full sense, poetry....The language of the book, at once luminous and discreet...remains in the mind." New Republic

Review:

"People I know who read A Death in the Family forty years ago still talk about it. So do I. It is a great book, and I'm happy to see it done anew." Andre Dubus, author of Dancing After Hours and Meditations From A Moveable Chair

About the Author

James Agee (1909-1955) was a poet, screenwriter, and journalist who won the Pulitzer Prize for his novel A Death in the Family.

What Our Readers Are Saying

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Average customer rating based on 1 comment:
Denise Barnett, July 20, 2008 (view all comments by Denise Barnett)
Wow, what a beautiful book. Agee, in Steinbeck tradition, does not waste a single word. Every description is so perfect you can actually see and FEEL it. So sweet and sad but really lovely. James Agee must have been a treat to know because I don't think you could write something this heartfelt without being a kind and gentle soul.
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Product Details

ISBN:
9780375701238
Author:
Agee, James
Publisher:
Vintage Books USA
Location:
New York :
Subject:
General
Subject:
Literary
Subject:
Fiction
Subject:
Boys
Subject:
Classics
Subject:
Family
Subject:
American fiction (fictional works by one author)
Subject:
Fathers and sons
Subject:
Domestic fiction
Subject:
Traffic accident victims
Subject:
Bildungsromane.
Subject:
Knoxville (Tenn.) Fiction.
Subject:
Knoxville
Subject:
Bildungsromans
Copyright:
Edition Number:
1
Edition Description:
VINTAGE INTL
Publication Date:
July 1998
Binding:
Paperback
Language:
English
Illustrations:
Y
Pages:
320
Dimensions:
8.14x5.18x.72 in. .52 lbs.

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