The popular media has adopted the name Lolita to describe any sexually precocious young woman with a penchant for twisting older men around her finger. The original Lolita, however, was a more mythical creature, a "nymphet" (Nabokov coined the word especially for her), who at a mere 12 years of age c

Charming, Dense, Elegant, Erotic, Lush, Post-war literature, Witty

The poet Karl Shapiro, in his introduction to the 1961 American publication of Henry Miller's "Tropic of Cancer," said, "Morally I regard Miller as a holy man'Gandhi with a penis." This was Miller's first book, and its pages were rife with full, frontal descriptions of sexual joy and despair. He ha

Beats, Bombast, Ebullient, Ecstatic, Erotic, Improvised, In-your-face, Manic, Modernist literature, Overflowing, Perverse, Post-war literature, Sincere

Unfortunately, little is known about the personal life of Thomas Pynchon, the man behind such innovative texts as "The Crying of Lot 49" (1966) and "Gravity's Rainbow" (1973). Carefully guarding his privacy ever since the 1961 publication of his first novel, "V.," Pynchon has nevertheless dazzled cri

Deconstructive, Excessive, Funny, Manic, Open-ended, Paranoid, Post-war literature, Postmodern fiction, Surreal, Trippy

While it may seem like a contradiction to speak of chaos and precision in the same sentence, the work of Jackson Pollock demands it. At the same time that his paintings depict disorder, frenetic abandon, and a turbulence of nearly cosmic proportions, they demonstrate perfect balance. The manner in wh

Abstract expressionism, Expansive, Formless, Loose, Playful, Post-war literature, Repetition, Rhythmic