by B.R. Myers
Unread - but see comment thread
What a great essay. If you ever wondered, say after putting down Johnathan Franzen's Freedom with a sigh of exasperation and disgust, how the English language (at least that written in American) ended up in such decline, B.R. Myer's A Reader's Manifesto has it all explained. This was an excellent an...
As is suggested in the subtitle, Myers uses this essay to point out how "pretentiousness" often passes for quality in modern American literature. He uses examples from Annie Proulx, Don DeLillo, Cormac McCarthy, Paul Auster, and David Guterson. I feel like I should preface this review by saying that...
A Reader’s Manifesto: An Attack on the Growing Pretentiousness in American Literary Prose by B. R. Meyers, which originally appeared (in an abbreviated form) as an essay in the Atlantic Magazine, set off a storm of controversy. Meyers bemoans the wordiness, mixed metaphors, and downright incoherency...
Log in with Facebook 
