Marcel Proust wrote one novel. It took a transformation from aristocrat to hermit, long nights in a cork-lined room (to drown out the bustling clamor of the Paris boulevards below), and more than ten years to write it. He called his opus, a tomb replete with half-page sentences and sinuous revelation

Aestheticist fiction, Anxiety, Excessive, Layered, Modernist literature, Neurotic, Overflowing, Perverse, Sensual

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

"I've got to keep experimenting. I feel like I'm just beginning. I have part of what I'm looking for in my grasp, but not all." John Coltrane's music is an experiment in emotional expression. He consistently pursued new domains of musical and spiritual intensity, and developed a style charged with pa

Beats, Distorted, Excessive, Experimental, Free jazz, Hard bop/post-bop, Improvised, Religious

It is the rare novelist who can elicit a contract for his death, but Salman Rushdie managed to do precisely that with a Postmodern, playful rumination on religion and politics that made Islamic literalists gnash their teeth and ready their Kalashnikovs. Born on the eve of India's declaration of indep

Dense, Epic, Excessive, Expansive, Magical realism, Playful, Political, Post-colonial literature, Postmodern fiction, Profane, Round, Sprawling, Wise assy