The Review of Contemporary Fiction

Leslie Fiedler and American Culture by Steven G. Kellman and Irving Malin
Richard Murphy

Steven G. Kellman and Irving Malin, eds. Leslie Fiedler and American Culture. Univ. of Delaware Press, 1999. 199 pp. $36.50.

This is a welcome Festschrift in honor of Leslie Fiedler, long a lightning rod in the study of American culture and literature. After an introduction and chronology, the volume begins with two samples of Fiedler’s thinking, including the landmark 1948 essay, “Come Back to the Raft Ag’in, Huck Honey!” Following this, a series of essays examines, by focusing on individual works, the breadth of Fiedler’s writing from fiction and autobiography through his literary criticism. The final section consists of paeans, some from such well-recognized names in the subject of American literature as John Barth, James M. Cox, R. W. B. Lewis, and Susan Gubar.

We are well reminded, at this moment of orthodoxy in the academy, of Fiedler’s interests and efforts: as Kellman notes in “The Importance of Being Busted,” the “theme of dissidence” has pervaded Fiedler’s life and work. Writing as an “amateur critic” for the nonprofessional audience, Fiedler successfully avoided the domination of the bastardized formalism of the late fifties and sixties, introducing to American readers a personal, readable, contextualized approach to various previously unidentified (or unspoken) cultural currents, such as the homoeroticism of classic American fiction, and “subliterary genres,” such as science fiction; he also took on popular culture as a worthwhile topic.

Of the material here, I found Winchell’s treatment of Fiedler and the New Criticism the most interesting and informative and Malin’s examination of The Art of the Essay, a classroom anthology edited by Fiedler, the most precious. The collection, deserving praise, recalls the cultural history of a generation: the conflict with conventionality and major movements still under way. These are exemplified in the life and work of Leslie Fiedler, which are well documented here. [Richard Murphy]


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The Review of Contemporary Fiction Leslie Fiedler and American Culture by Steven G. Kellman and Irving Malin Richard Murphy Steven G. Kellman and Irving Malin, eds. Leslie Fiedler and American Culture. Univ. of Delaware Press, 1999. 199 pp. $36.50. This is a welcome Festschrift in honor of Leslie Fiedler, long a lightning rod in the study of American culture and literature. After an introduction and chronology, the volume begins with two samples of Fiedler’s thinking, including the landmark 1948 essay, “Come Back to the Raft Ag’in, Huck Honey!” Following this, a series of essays examines, by focusing on individual works, the breadth of Fiedler’s writing from fiction and autobiography through his literary criticism. The final section consists of paeans, some from such well-recognized names in the subject of American literature as John Barth, James M. Cox, R. W. B. Lewis, and Susan Gubar. We are well reminded, at this moment of orthodoxy in the academy, of Fiedler’s interests and efforts: as Kellman notes in “The Importance of Being Busted,” the “theme of dissidence” has pervaded Fiedler’s life and work. Writing as an “amateur critic” for the nonprofessional audience, Fiedler successfully avoided the domination of the bastardized formalism of the late fifties and sixties, introducing to American readers a personal, readable, contextualized approach to various previously unidentified (or unspoken) cultural currents, such as the homoeroticism of classic American fiction, and “subliterary genres,” such as science fiction; he also took on popular culture as a worthwhile topic. Of the material here, I found Winchell’s treatment of Fiedler and the New Criticism the most interesting and informative and Malin’s examination of The Art of the Essay, a classroom anthology edited by Fiedler, the most precious. The collection, deserving praise, recalls the cultural history of a generation: the conflict with conventionality and major movements still under way. These are exemplified in the life and work of Leslie Fiedler, which are well documented here. [Richard Murphy]

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