John Edgar Wideman Summary

During the 1960s, the architects of the black arts movement--Imamu Baraka (LeRoi Jones), Larry Neal, Haki R. Madhubuti (Don L. Lee), Addison Gayle, and others--demanded that black writers use their ta... Read more

In the following review, Schaeffer surveys the dominant themes of the stories in Fever: Twelve Stories. Images of blindness, of masks, of facades, of mirrors, of reflections, dominate Fever [Fever: Tw... Read more

In the following review, Kenan discusses the defining characteristics of the stories comprising Fever: Twelve Stories. “Do not look for straightforward, linear steps from book to book,” ... Read more

In the following favorable review of The Stories of John Edgar Wideman, Gorra compares Wideman's short fiction to that of William Faulkner. Any American fiction writer who sets the bulk of his ... Read more

In the following review, Birkerts asserts that Wideman is America's leading African American male writer and provides a thematic overview of his short stories. Success comes in different ways t... Read more

In the following mixed review, Wood provides a stylistic analysis of the stories in All Stories Are True. To make writing flow like speech—to make a pool seem like a stream—may be the ha... Read more

In the following essay, Byerman delineates the unifying themes and stylistic aspects of the stories comprising All Stories Are True. Some of the stories in All Stories Are True (1992) continue the con... Read more

In the following essay, Gysin provides historical background to Wideman's “Fever” as well as a stylistic analysis of the story. “Telling the story right will make it read.&... Read more

In the following essay, Hoem investigates the role of “ancestral constructs” in Wideman's “Damballah” and The Cattle Killing. We are difference … our reason i... Read more

Coleman is an American educator. In the following essay, he delineates Wideman's return to the thematic realm of family and community in his works following The Lynchers. In a 1972 interview [r... Read more

Gorra is an American educator and critic. In the following review he draws comparisons between Wideman and William Faulkner, and applauds Wideman's characterizations and narrative skills in The... Read more

In the following interview, Wideman discusses the "fictional, constructed landscapes" he created in his works. I went to Amherst, Massachusetts, on April 23, 1992, to talk with John Edga... Read more

In the following review, Watkins provides a laudatory assessment of Fatheralong. John Edgar Wideman's latest book, Fatheralong, is a hybrid. It is at once a memoir and a meditation on fatherhoo... Read more

In the following review, Pinsker responds negatively to Fatheralong. Race in America has been compared to a moose on the dining room table: nobody wants to call attention to the carcass despite the fa... Read more

Seymour is an American journalist, editor, and author of such works as Jazz: The Great American Art. In the following review, he reflects on the absence of imagination in modern society and responds f... Read more

Birkerts is a noted critic and author of several books, including The Gutenberg Elegies: The Fate of Reading in an Electronic Age (1995). In the following review, he offers a negative appraisal of The... Read more

In the following review, Wood delineates Wideman's handling of the various themes, characters, and subjects in The Cattle Killing and Brothers and Keepers. 'Maybe this is a detective sto... Read more

Dretzka is an American journalist and critic. In the following review, he offers a favorable assessment of Reuben. I wasn't prepared for this book, the impact it would have on me. Sure, I knew ... Read more

Wilson is an American educator and critic. In the following essay, he examines how Wideman combines both elements of the history of an individual family and of American society as a whole in The Homew... Read more

Berben is writer and educator at the Université de Nice. In the following essay, she uses examples from Toni Morrison's novel, Sula, to illustrate her explication of the significance of ... Read more

"Emancipating From Society" In "Our Time," John Wideman bravely dives into the pits of a scorpion society - one that juxtaposes the poor and minorities with the rich and people in power - in an atte... Read more