From Powells.com
"The title of William H. Gass's latest essay collection implicitly invites the reader to consider whether or not Mr. Gass will pass the test of time that every writer eventually faces. Chances are that his esoteric fiction, enjoyed by a small and mostly academic audience, will not, but that his witty and often elitist essays will. For an explanation of why, one need only read a few pages of Tests of Time to experience the ferocious, indispensable intellect of one of America's most celebrated essayists." Jason Picone, Powells.com (read the entire Powells.com review)
Synopses & Reviews
Tests of Time brings us fourteen witty and elegant essays by novelist and literary critic William H. Gass, "the finest prose stylist in America" (Steven Moore, Washington Post). Whether he's exploring the nature of narrative, the extent and cost of political influences on writers, or the relationships between the stories we tell and the moral judgments we make, Gass is always erudite, entertaining, and enlightening.
Review
"Gass...produces remarkably succinct and well-thought-out criticism in a passionate and precise yet easy and vernacular-based language....All the essays retain care and gusto; even a meditation on history and lies based around the O.J. Simpson trial feels fresh." Publishers Weekly
Review
"Each audacious, masterfully crafted, and resounding essay...is grounded in erudition, spiked with a naughty wit, and charged with a trenchant passion for and belief in literature, and each reveals shimmering vistas of his great intellect and fluent humanitarianism." Donna Seaman, Booklist (Starred Review)
Review
"The collection goes astray during its middle third, which is devoted to political essays featuring warmed-over tirades against the vulgarities of modern culture and the oppressiveness of censorship. Gass is more convincing when he writes about the things he loves..." The New Yorker
Review
"Always provocative and often profound essays. Gass writes about the philosophical implications of narrative, the rage for newness, lists in literature, and best of all, the test of time. In the essay of that title, he dares to ask the question: What makes great literature great?" Barbara Fisher, Boston Globe
Review
"A collection of sparkling and impassioned essays. Gass continues his exploration into the nature of narrative, the flowering of literary excellence and the fate of language in society." Benjamin Anastas, The New York Times Book Review
Review
"There's not a dull piece to be found in the volume, whether Gass is praising Italo Calvino's Invisible Cities or explaining why he thinks imprisonment has led to so much great writing....Immensely pleasing." Chris Barsanti, Book Magazine
Review
"[W]itty and erudite..." Library Journal
About the Author
William H. Gass was born in Fargo, North Dakota. He is the recipient of the first PEN/Nabokov Award, a National Book Critics Circle Award for Criticism, a Lanan Foundation Lifetime Achievement Award, a Medal of Merit for Fiction, an Award for Fiction from the Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, and fellowships from both the Rockefeller and Guggenheim Foundations. He is the author also of Reading Rilke, Cartesian Sonota, and Finding a Form. He lives in St. Louis.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
LITERARY MATTERS
The Nature of Narrative and Its Philosophical Implications
Anywhere but Kansas
Invisible Cities
Sidelonging
I've Got a Little List
The Test of Time
SOCIAL AND POLITICAL CONTRETEMPS
The Writer and Politics: A Litany
Tribalism, Identity, and Ideology
The Shears of the Censor
Were There Anything in the World Worth Worship
How German Are We?
THE STUTTGART SEMINAR LECTURES
Quotations from Chairman Flaubert
There Was an Old Woman Who
Transformations