Gilbert Sorrentino Critical Essay | Critical Essay by Malcolm Bradbury

Critical Essay by Malcolm Bradbury

Since all literature is susceptible to parody, why not, then make parody literature? Gilbert Sorrentino has, with impressive results. "Mulligan Stew" has given me as much pleasure and intellectual joy as I have had from a novel in a long time.

"Mulligan Stew" is a work of contemporary experiment, and there are those who will classify it under the new, somewhat sagging banner of post-modernism, a movement ripe for redevelopment. But it is experiment raised to such a level of comedy—Flann O'Brien, whose influence pervades this novel, calls it "hilaritas," and it is a true esthetic principle—that it often risks all intellectual conviction in giving enjoyment (though it often forfeits enjoyment for the sake of intellectual conviction)….

No reader should be put off by the news that this is a book about writing….

The book's pleasure lies in its conviction that anything—and nothing—may be done with words. Plots are absurd...
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