Since 1972 Barry Hannah has published two novels and a prize-winning collection of short stories. His third novel, Ray, is scheduled for publication in fall 1980. While some stories and novel segments...
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As is probably the case with all twentieth-century writers of the American South who deal in quirky narratives replete with violence, Barry Hannah has had his share of encounters with critics and read...
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Critical Essay by Jim Harrison
"Geronimo Rex" is a stunning piece of entertainment, almost a totally successful book…. Hannah is one of those young writers who is brilliantly drun...
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Critical Essay by Benjamin Demott
[While] "Ray" is the funniest, weirdest, soul-happiest work of fiction by a genuinely young American author that I've read in a long while, ordin...
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Critical Essay by Eliot Fremont-smith
Barry Hannah's Ray … is a song. Sharp and snappy snatches for the most part, above the electrics, cool and hot, of being alive….
It's ...
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Critical Essay by Ronald Nevans
Barry Hannah, who wrote the extravagantly praised Airships, is a master of the short form. Yet [Ray] often reads like a collection of sketches. It is diffuse—cha...
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Critical Essay by Geoffrey Wolff
The sometimes third-person hero who gives the title to [Ray], usually told by him in first person, is an alcoholic medical doctor and veteran jet fighter pilot alive a...
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Critical Essay by John Romano
In its peculiar way—and its way is endlessly peculiar—Ray is a novel of the South….
[Barry Hannah's world] has the lyricism and silliness-with...
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Critical Essay by John Updike
["Geronimo Rex"] belongs to an older tradition—the whining-adolescent novel of the fifties. The action begins in 1950, when the hero, Harry Monroe, i...
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Critical Essay by Jonathan Yardley
[Barry Hannah's] first novel, "Geronimo Rex," was published last year to general, if tempered, praise; it is a crazy and messy piece of work whi...
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Critical Essay by John Skow
Of all the rich array of error in a book reviewer's repertoire of philistinism, the worst may be that of falling in love with an author's first novel, and the...
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Critical Essay by Michael Wood
Biloxi, Vicksburg, Mobile, Newark, Santa Fe, Richmond, Atlanta, Tuscaloosa: The names all appear in Barry Hannah's striking book of short stories ["Airship...
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Critical Essay by Richard Locke
In recent weeks—somewhat to our suprise—we have run three front-page reviews of fiction by young American writers. Mary Gordon's "Final Paym...
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Critical Essay by Michael Malone
In an ultimate, though not obvious way, Hannah's stories [in Airships] are fused together thematically; the tactic is reminiscent of Faulkner's Go Down M...
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Critical Essay by Christopher Lehmann-haupt
In "Ray," Barry Hannah's startling new novel, set in the American South, we have come a long way from the hanging moss and stately colu...
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Critical Essay by Harry Crews
What kind of story can be told by a jet fighter pilot who fought—who fights—in the Civil War? The answer is a damn fine one. [In Ray] Barry Hannah very near...
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In the following interview, which was conducted on April 27, 1982, Hannah discusses his literary influences, his characters, and aspects of his personal life.
[Vanarsdall]: To start off, who do you co...
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In the following essay, Weston focuses on issues of identity and self-worth in Hannah's male protagonists.
In an interview for a 1984 volume of Contemporary Authors [Volume 110], Jan Gretlund a...
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In the excerpt below, Seib focuses on several of the stories in Airships and analyzes Hannah's mythic treatment of J. E. B. Stuart, a prominent general in the Confederate army during the Americ...
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In the following excerpt, Charney analyzes Geronimo Rex and Nightwatchmen, focusing on structure, character, and such themes as violence and identity.
In an interview with R. Vanarsdall for the Southe...
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In the following review, Raksin distinguishes the representation of violence in Hannah's works from that of such authors as Bret Easton Ellis.
There's a scene in Barry Hannah's 19...
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In the following excerpt from a review of Bats out of Hell, Blythe remarks on Hannah's characters and admiration for Jimi Hendrix.
It's altogether fitting that Jimi Hendrix is one of Bar...
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In the following review of Bats out of Hell, Wiggins comments on the major themes of Hannah's fiction and his insights into the male psyche.
Who is he?
A railroad track toward hell?
&#...
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In the following essay, which was first presented in an abbreviated form at the South Central Modern Language Association conference in October 1994, Weston examines themes of war, heroism, honor, and...
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An American critic and journalist, Eder received a Pulitzer Prize for criticism in 1987. In the following review, he remarks favorably on Hey Jack!
In the white hell of winter warfare in Korea, Homer,...
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Edwards is an American educator and critic. In the following review, he asserts that Hey Jack! pales in comparison to Hannah's earlier works.
Since his first novel, Geronimo Rex, won the Willia...
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In the following essay, Shepherd argues that Captain Maximus is a disappointing work that lacks the focus and freshness of Airships, Hannah's first collection.
Perhaps exculpatory jacket copy o...
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In the following review, Kennedy remarks favorably on Boomerang.
Though middle age has chastened Barry Hannah a bit, the Mississippi macho-romantic is still a tremendous lover of the lustiness of life...
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In the following review, Kennedy praises Hannah's style in Boomerang but finds it difficult to empathize with the author's persona.
We must forgive Barry Hannah his inability to mention ...
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In the review below, Coates remarks on Never Die.
There are all kinds of ways to write good fiction. Barry Hannah's way is to kick capital-L Literature in the crotch and make it wail, a lively ...
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In following review of Never Die, Kaye faults Hannah for not fully developing his characters.
Barry Hannah can succinctly and with great good humor evoke the profound bewilderment of the human conditi...
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In the excerpt below, the critic comments briefly on Never Die.
After the uncharacteristic mildness of his last book, Boomerang, this Mississippi author has returned to form—and gone Westȁ...
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In the following essay, Weston suggests that Barry Hannah's Vietnam stories attempt to make sense out of the violence of the Vietnam era, and views his stories within the context of Southern hi...
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In the following essay, Charney classifies the stories in Barry Hannah's Airships as works about the literal and figurative battlefields of the Civil and Vietnam wars.
In “Water Liars,&#...
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In the following excerpt, Gilman underscores the significant role of violence in Barry Hannah's fiction and surveys his Vietnam War short stories from a Southern perspective.
In an early overvi...
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Barry Hannah
