Word: franzenã
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Dates: during 2001-2001
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...huge commercial success, but reviewers were fairly enthusiastic. Comparisons to other authors included Updike, Irving and DeLillo, and some even speculated that Franzen might prove himself to be a successor to the likes of DeLillo and Pynchon. But another reason that people are paying so much attention to Franzen??s newest novel is the 1996 Harper’s piece in which he lamented the state of American fiction and argued that the way to save the American novel from irrelevancy was to connect “the personal and the social,” to write about...
With his third novel, Franzen has admirably succeeded in exploring personal dramas while offering a striking picture of American culture. These ambitions make The Corrections a complex and sophisticated work, but Franzen??s skill is such the novel is a charming and touching reading experience as well. The Corrections has a remarkable view of the world, and this is made apparent through our encounters with the Lambert family. We first meet Enid and Alfred performing the slow and futile rituals of married life after retirement. Alfred, reticent and principled, is waging a stubborn battle against Parkinson?...
...that will make up for any and all of the imperfections that plague their lives. Before we get to Christmas, however, Franzen is busy sketching out the big picture details of American life through the Lamberts’ various misadventures. If a life is lived in the details, then Franzen??s grasp of the Lamberts’ inner and superficial lives is fabulous. He gives us striking and pitch-perfect accounts of the crises and triumphs and weird lines of internal reasoning exhibited by his characters, who are involved in episodes such as a biotech IPO, a fraudulent...
...greatest delights in The Corrections is the experience of coming to know Franzen??s characters, who are all trying, in one way or another, to make those necessary adjustments referred to by the title. His careful rendering of the constant struggle, forward motion and backward glances inherent in every life make the novel a full and rich experience. It is through the Lamberts, in the movements of their carefully portrayed lives, that the novel achieves its richness. Of course, it is more than a matter of who the Lamberts are; it is also in the way we perceive...
...compelling picture of America, requisite for any so-called American novel, does indeed emerge, but not so much through Franzen??s explorations of sexuality, economic motivations and rewards or mental instabilities as through the Lamberts’ perceptions and reactions to those things. For in the end, the novel is about exactly what its title suggests. A correction in the stock market is but one of many kinds of corrections, or attempts at them, in the book. We can try to fix situations in our own lives, but a correction can also be produced seemingly naturally. A system...