The Review of Contemporary Fiction

Conjunctions 29: Tributes: American Writers on American Writers by Martine Bellen
Brooke Horvath

Martine Bellen, Lee Smith, and Bradford Morrow, eds. Conjunctions 29: Tributes: American Writers on American Writers. Bard College, 1997. 405 pp. Paper: $12.00.

The editors of this special issue of Conjunctions describe Tributes as “an anthology of personal enthusiasms.” As they explain, “a number of contemporary writers were invited to pay homage to an American writer, one who made something possible for them, whether that was the act of writing itself, or writing a certain book, or in a particular manner, or living in a way that was consonant with the work of writing.”
The result is forty-five essays running from half of a page (Diane Williams on Emily Dickinson) to twenty-nine pages (Carole Maso on Gertrude Stein) but averaging five to eight pages. Some are self-focussed (“I read a lot as a kid,” begins John Sayles’s essay on Nelson Algren) or boldly idiosyncratic (Cole Swensen on Marianne Moore), others genially academic (Joanna Scott on Poe) or overflowing with quotations as though in recognition of the fact that to recall approvingly an author’s own words is the best tribute (Ntozake Shange on Sterling Brown). Some contributors offer straightforward commentary or defenses of writers felt to be misunderstood or underappreciated (Ellen McLaughin on Lillian Hellman), others impressionistic collages (C. D. Wright on Frank Stanford) or lists of discrete particulars (Peter Straub on Raymond Chandler). Still others tender thanks or gush eloquently. All take their subjects personally, and all are magnanimous.
Filled with good writing and provocative insights, Tributes raises any number of questions about the Americanness of American literature, the changing import and constituency of our literary past, and the importance of understanding what one is doing by grasping what others have done. If it is true, as Emerson once wrote, that “sometimes a scream is better than a thesis,” many of these brief essays remind us that it is also the case that sometimes a tribute is better than a dissertation. [Brooke Horvath]


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The Review of Contemporary Fiction Conjunctions 29: Tributes: American Writers on American Writers by Martine Bellen Brooke Horvath Martine Bellen, Lee Smith, and Bradford Morrow, eds. Conjunctions 29: Tributes: American Writers on American Writers. Bard College, 1997. 405 pp. Paper: $12.00. The editors of this special issue of Conjunctions describe Tributes as “an anthology of personal enthusiasms.” As they explain, “a number of contemporary writers were invited to pay homage to an American writer, one who made something possible for them, whether that was the act of writing itself, or writing a certain book, or in a particular manner, or living in a way that was consonant with the work of writing.” The result is forty-five essays running from half of a page (Diane Williams on Emily Dickinson) to twenty-nine pages (Carole Maso on Gertrude Stein) but averaging five to eight pages. Some are self-focussed (“I read a lot as a kid,” begins John Sayles’s essay on Nelson Algren) or boldly idiosyncratic (Cole Swensen on Marianne Moore), others genially academic (Joanna Scott on Poe) or overflowing with quotations as though in recognition of the fact that to recall approvingly an author’s own words is the best tribute (Ntozake Shange on Sterling Brown). Some contributors offer straightforward commentary or defenses of writers felt to be misunderstood or underappreciated (Ellen McLaughin on Lillian Hellman), others impressionistic collages (C. D. Wright on Frank Stanford) or lists of discrete particulars (Peter Straub on Raymond Chandler). Still others tender thanks or gush eloquently. All take their subjects personally, and all are magnanimous. Filled with good writing and provocative insights, Tributes raises any number of questions about the Americanness of American literature, the changing import and constituency of our literary past, and the importance of understanding what one is doing by grasping what others have done. If it is true, as Emerson once wrote, that “sometimes a scream is better than a thesis,” many of these brief essays remind us that it is also the case that sometimes a tribute is better than a dissertation. [Brooke Horvath]

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