Maureen Corrigan

Coming To 'Americanah': Two Tales Of Immigrant Experience

Maureen Corrigan — Wed, 15 May 2013 17:08:00 +0000

First things first: Can we talk about hair? Nigerian writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie has written a big knockout of a novel about immigration, American dreams, the power of first love, and the shifting meanings of skin color; but, as Adichie has said in interviews, she also knows that black women's hair can speak volumes about racial politics.

Postgraduate Post-Mortem In A Smart, Literary Mystery

Maureen Corrigan — Tue, 07 May 2013 11:03:00 +0000

There are many things to savor about Elanor Dymott's debut suspense novel, Every Contact Leaves a Trace -- among them, its baroque narrative structure and its clever manipulation of the stock, husband-who-hasn't-got-a-clue character. But Dymott really won me over when she pulled Robert Browning out of her crime kit. Nobody reads Robert Browning anymore, do they? As far as I can tell, high schools have thrown in the towel when it comes to teaching Victorian poetry; dissertations on Browning's dramatic monologues have all but dried up.

Godwin's 'Flora': A Tale Of Remorse That Creeps Under Your Skin

Maureen Corrigan — Mon, 06 May 2013 16:56:00 +0000

Gail Godwin says one of the inspirations for her new novel, called Flora, is Henry James' ghost story The Turn of the Screw. Both stories take place in isolated old houses, and both revolve around mental contests between a governess character and her young charge.

'Equilaterial': Martians, Oil And A Hole In The Desert

Maureen Corrigan — Wed, 24 Apr 2013 17:14:00 +0000

Equilateral is a weird little novel, but any reader familiar with Ken Kalfus expects his writing to go off-road. Kalfus wrote one of the best and certainly the least sentimental novels about New York City post-9/11. I loved A Disorder Peculiar to the Country, but I stopped assigning it to students in my New York lit class because they were usually turned off by its black humor and lack of uplift. Equilateral doesn't run that same risk of being in bad taste as social commentary because, at first, it doesn't seem to have anything to do with current events.

Beauty Marks: Patricia Volk's Lessons In Womanhood

Maureen Corrigan — Thu, 11 Apr 2013 19:28:00 +0000

I've loved Patricia Volk's writing ever since I read her evocative 2002 memoir, Stuffed, which told the story of her grandfather — who introduced pastrami to America — as well as the rest of her family, who fed New Yorkers for more than 100 years in their various restaurants. Stuffed, like the best food memoirs, served up so much more on its plate than just a bagel and a schmear. So when I picked up Volk's new memoir, Shocked, my appetite was already whetted for the humor of her writing, its emotional complexity and smarts.

'Burgess Boys' Family Saga Explores The Authenticity Of Imperfection

Maureen Corrigan — Wed, 03 Apr 2013 17:16:00 +0000

In 1846, Edgar Allan Poe wrote a famous essay called "The Philosophy of Composition," in which he sounds like an interior decorator. I say that because in the essay, Poe insists that all good writing must strive for what he calls "unity of effect." For Poe, it was important that everything in his short stories — characters, setting, narration — add up to one big "color-me-terrified" impact.

I kept thinking of Poe's matchy-matchy theory of writing as I was reading Elizabeth Strout's new novel, The Burgess Boys.

The Apathy In 'A Thousand Pardons' Is Hard To Forgive

Maureen Corrigan — Wed, 27 Mar 2013 18:09:00 +0000

Jonathan Dee likes to write about rich, good-looking people falling apart — and who among the 99 percent of us can't enjoy that plot? In The Privileges, the dad of the family was a Wall Street trader, tempted by existential boredom into larceny; in A Thousand Pardons, the dad of the family is a partner in a New York law firm, tempted by existential boredom into a disastrous workplace affair. The women in Dee's recent fiction tend to be decorative stay-at-home moms; that is, until the spontaneous combustion of hubby's career expels them out of their silken domestic cocoons.

'Lean In': Not Much Of A Manifesto, But Still A Win For Women

Maureen Corrigan — Tue, 12 Mar 2013 18:01:00 +0000

Sheryl Sandberg tells an anecdote in her new book, Lean In, about sitting down with her boss, Mark Zuckerberg, for her first performance review as chief operating officer at Facebook.

A Fiendish Fly Recalls Kafka In 'Jacob's Folly'

Maureen Corrigan — Wed, 06 Mar 2013 19:30:00 +0000

Man awakens to find out he has turned into an insect. And the Double Jeopardy question is, "What is Kafka's The Metamorphosis?" Well, what other response could there possibly be? Kafka all but cornered the market on that verminous plot in 1915; although, after nearly 100 years, the exclusivity clause may be about to expire. It takes a gutsy writer to pad in Gregor Samsa's sticky steps, but, by now, Rebecca Miller is clearly used to coping with the anxiety of influence and staying true to her own vision.

Dorothea Lange's 'Migrant Mother' Inspires The Story Of 'Mary Coin'

Maureen Corrigan — Thu, 28 Feb 2013 16:52:00 +0000

I shied away from Marisa Silver's new novel because of its book jacket: a reproduction of Dorothea Lange's iconic Depression-era photograph called "Migrant Mother." You know it: the woman's strong face is worn and worried; her children lean protectively into her. Lange took the photo at a pea-pickers' camp in California in 1936; the name of the destitute mother of seven, who wasn't identified till the 1970s, is Florence Owens Thompson.

Karen Russell's 'Vampires' Deserve The Raves

Maureen Corrigan — Thu, 21 Feb 2013 18:13:00 +0000

I don't have a good track record when it comes to raving about Karen Russell. Last year, along with my two fellow judges, I nominated Russell's novel, Swamplandia!, as well as two other finalists, for the Pulitzer Prize. Result? The Pulitzer Board made headlines by deciding not to give out the award in Fiction. Nevertheless, I rave on: this time about Russell's new short story collection, Vampires in the Lemon Grove.

The Satisfactions Of Simplicity In 'Jackal's Share'

Maureen Corrigan — Thu, 21 Feb 2013 12:03:00 +0000

Chris Morgan Jones' latest espionage novel, The Jackal's Share, makes a reader appreciate the attractions of simplicity. There aren't any glitzy tricks here: no over-the-top villains or weapons arsenals; no le Carre-like meditations on the existential identity of the spy.

Instead, with a British appreciation for understatement, Jones elegantly executes the basic elements of the conventional thriller. Take one lone-wolf agent and set him on the trail of an enigmatic big shot with sketchy business associates.

A Soured Student-Teacher Friendship Threatens 'Everything'

Maureen Corrigan — Tue, 12 Feb 2013 18:38:00 +0000

Over the past week or so, I've mentioned James Lasdun's new book, Give Me Everything You Have to a bunch of colleagues; they've all heard about it already and they're all dying to read it. What Amy Chua's Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother was to parenting a couple of years ago, Lasdun's Give Me Everything You Have may well be to teaching: a controversial personal reflection on the professor-student relationship — except Lasdun, unlike Chua, really has no advice to offer; no certitude, nor help for pain.

Jane Austen's 'Pride And Prejudice' At 200

Maureen Corrigan — Mon, 28 Jan 2013 18:54:00 +0000

My favorite item from the growing mountain of Pride and Prejudice bicentennial trivia comes courtesy of an article in something called Regency World Magazine, which is going gaga over the anniversary. The article, "Albert Goes Ape for Austen," describes how a 200-pound orangutan named Albert, living in the Gdansk Zoo in Poland, insists on having 50 pages a night of Pride and Prejudice read to him at bedtime by his keeper or else he refuses to go to sleep.

What does Albert the orangutan hear in Pride and Prejudice, I wonder?

How A 'Madwoman' Upended A Literary Boys Club

Maureen Corrigan — Thu, 17 Jan 2013 18:00:00 +0000

This week, the National Book Critics Circle announced that two feminist literary scholars, Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar, would be the recipients of its 2013 Lifetime Achievement Award.

The front cover of my paperback copy of The Madwoman in the Attic got torn off years ago; the back cover is hanging on courtesy of bubbled Scotch tape. On the title page, I wrote my name and the date 1981, which means I bought my copy in graduate school, two years after Madwoman came out.