Husain Naqvi ~ Critical Digressions: Literary Pugilists, Underground Men

from 3 Quarks Daily

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls,

After being attacked for a number of years by a new generation of literary critics – indeed, phantom-punched, sucker-punched, body-slammed – “contemporary” (or “postmodern”) prose has hit back: in this month’s Harper’s, one Ben Marcus has donned his fighting gloves – which seem a little big for his hands, his pasty, bony frame – climbed into the ring, earnestly, knocky-kneed, sweating from the hot floodlights, the flashes, the hoarse roar of the audience, the sense of anticipation, broken noses, blood...

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