In 1980 Black Sparrow Press reissued John Fante's long-out-of-print 1939 novel, Ask the Dust, initiating a process that would lead in the next eleven years to the reissue of nearly all Fante's work. Only a few of his magazine stories have not been...

STEPHEN COOPER. FSC/North Point, $30 (398p) ISBN 0-86547-554-7 * Hailed by many as the great novel about L.A., Ask the Dust (Stackpole, 1939) was primed to place Fante--and his alter-ego Arturo Bandini-- in the American literaty world forever. Cooper, a film lechirer...

"Ask the Dust" is one of the most eagerly awaited movies this season, which makes it all the more disappointing. On paper, the project looked bulletproof: Robert Towne, the screenwriter who brought Depression-era Los Angeles to such vivid life in his script for "Chinatown,"...

In the following essay, Collins delineates the major thematic concerns of the stories comprising Dago Red.

In the following essay, Collins investigates the role of baseball in Fante's novels and short fiction.

In the following essay, Weber contends that Fante's early fiction “offers a rich testament to how the often disabling powers of shame and self-hatred can somehow inspire the literary imagination.”