Reviewed by Daniel James Sundahl It’s been four decades since Harold Bloom published The Anxiety of Influence. Bloom’s theory is that creative writers are hindered in their work because they maintain ambiguous relationships with precursor writers. He’s enlarged his theory these days by referencing precursor writers as “daemons.” I mention this because in his foreword […]
“The Best of Enemies,” by Jen Lancaster
September 11, 2015 by Leave a Comment
Reviewed by Daniel Sundahl I was at lunch one time with a group of students who were regaling me with the comedy antics of Seinfeld. I asked how many years the program had been on television and about favorite characters. It went from there. I confessed having watched only a few episodes, reruns at that […]
“From Midnight to Guntown,” by John Hailman
August 21, 2015 by Leave a Comment
Reviewed by Daniel Sundahl If I remember right there’s a commemorative statue of William Faulkner on the Oxford, Mississippi, City Hall front lawn. He’s seated on a park bench; there’s a patrician elegance to the statue, legs crossed, pipe in hand, a battered (what was likely brown) hat. What’s missing is a glass of “branch […]
“Fate Moreland’s Widow,” by John Lane
July 16, 2015 by Leave a Comment
Reviewed by Daniel Sundahl There was a time when the Canaan River had been left free to run through the valley, years before the senior George McCane harnessed “the power of falling water” (emphasis added). Ben Crocker, the first-person narrator of the novel, makes this observation in 1988, a half-century after the events that developed […]
Daniel Sundahl
July 15, 2015 by Leave a Comment
Daniel James Sundahl is Emeritus Professor in American Studies and English at Hillsdale College where he taught for over 32 years. Prior to retirement he was Kirk Distinguished Professor in American Studies. He’s relocated from Michigan to South Carolina.