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

Kurt Vonnegut's curious blend of Science Fiction, black humor, absurdity, and relentless irony may be his way of dealing with an incomprehensible world. His hybridized fiction certainly offers an escapist alternative, one that Vonnegut has elaborated over 30 years of literary production. Faced in rea

Anxiety, Contemporary comedianism, Fantastic, Post-war literature, Quirky, Whimsical, Witty

In 1961, seven years after J.D. Salinger began his lifelong, self-imposed exile from public life, John Updike described the author as "a uniquely relevant literary artist." Whether Salinger thought Updike's statement was a compliment or a slight is irrelevant. Criticism, publicity, or praise -- Salin

Angry, Dark, Dystopic, Post-war literature, Psychological, Rebel