In the following essay, Taylor locates the importance of alcohol as part of the mythic structure of William Kennedy's novel Ironweed.
The hero of William Kennedy's Ironweed, Francis P...
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Critical Essay by Peter S. Prescott
A good novel announces itself on its opening page: whatever distinctiveness of vision and discipline of language its author can muster will be at once apparent. In...
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Critical Essay by Publishers Weekly
["Ironweed" is the] third in a series of novels set in Albany, N.Y., [and] this strong, authentic book bursts with black humor and stinging insights ...
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Critical Essay by Christopher Lehmann-haupt
"Ironweed"—which refers to a tough-stemmed member of the sunflower family—recounts a few days in the life of an Albany skid-row...
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Critical Essay by Paul Gray
[William Kennedy, a] lifelong resident of Albany, has shown again how certain talents flourish best in native soil. Ironweed dovetails with its predecessor. The scene is s...
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In William Kennedy's Ironweed, there is a thin line between the living and the dead, where it seems that in 1930's Albany the bums are physically alive, but spiritually dead, and the only way to find ...
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Back rooms and saloons where William Kennedy's characters prowled are stops on a trolley tour. The local orchestra is tuning up for a concerto based on his latest work. And residents around this ci...
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Norman Mailer, the pugnacious prince of American letters who for decades reigned as the country's literary conscience and provocateur with such books as "The Naked and the Dead" and "The Executione...
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Norman Mailer, the pugnacious prince of American letters who for decades reigned as the country's literary conscience and provocateur with such books as "The Naked and the Dead" and "The Executione...
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Anya Taylor
Ironweed: The Living Are Better Off When They Die
Albany honors novelist William Kennedy
