Description
Book SynopsisChallenges the commonly held notion that post-World War II American fiction eschewed the economic for the psychological or the spiritual. This title shows how both the form and content of postwar fiction responded to the transformation of the American middle class from small property owners to white-collar employees.
Trade Review"This excellent book offers an original and highly provocative argument about a vital period of American literary and cultural history. Bold and often brilliant, its graceful expository style illuminates an impressively wide range of material without ever becoming scholastic. Most importantly, it proposes new and highly plausible ways of understanding the significance of a number of important literary works."
—Sean McCann, Wesleyan University, author of Gumshoe America"
The Twilight of the Middle Class is a powerful, well-researched, and unique piece of scholarship that fills a gap in current approaches to Cold War era fiction by situating it within the economic framework that shaped it. Through perceptive and fresh readings of Ayn Rand, Ralph Ellison, Flannery O'Connor, and Saul Bellow, its author demonstrates that the era's fiction is preoccupied with the problem of the 'organization man,' who translates concerns about class into concerns about individual autonomy—and by doing so universalizes his economically specific complaint into a shared human condition."
—Rachel Adams, Columbia University, author of Sideshow U.S.ATable of ContentsAcknowledgments ix INTRODUCTION: The Twilight of the Middle Class 1 CHAPTER ONE: Ayn Rand and the Politics of Property 33 CHAPTER TWO: Race Man,Organization Man,Invisible Man 53 CHAPTER THREE: "The So-Called Jewish Novel" 70 CHAPTER FOUR: Flannery O'Connor and the Southern Origins of Identity Politics 95 EPILOGUE: The Postmodern Fallacy 113 Notes 131 Index 155
