Writers in crisis; the American novel, 1925-1940 Ring Lardiner Ernest Hemingway John Doc Passos William Faulkner Thomas Wolfe John Steinbeck by Maxwell Geismar

Includes index

This book is about the six writers listed in the subtitle.

[Preface to the fourth printing:] A retake from the Sixties -- One Ring Lardiner: Like something was going to happen -- Two Ernest Hemingway: You could always come back -- Three John Dos Passos: Conversion of a hero -- Four William Faulkner: The Negro and the female -- Five Thomas Wolfe: The unfound door -- Six John Steinbeck: Of wrath or joy -- Seven Success story, finis

"Edmund Wilson wrote when "Writers in Crisis" was first published [in 1947]: 'As I write literary criticism myself, I rarely consider reading it a treat; but this book of Maxwell Geismar's has really roused me out of my apathy. It seems to me the best book of criticism I have read on a contemporary American subject.' The book opens with Ring Lardiner, who summarizes the values of the 1920s, the boom, the jazz age. It closes with John Steinbeck, who illuminates the values of the 1940s. Between these two we see what happened to the work of Hemingway, Dos Passos, Faulkner, and Thomas Wolfe. Each of these writers lived and wrote during some of the nation's most critical years; in this volume Mr. Geismar shows clearly the interaction of the creative mind and social pressure." -- from back cover.