SOURCE: "Finding the Center of the Earth: Satire, History, and Myth in 'Little Big Man'," in Western American Literature, Vol. XV, No. 3, Fall, 1980, pp. 195-211.

In the following essay, Cleary identifies Thomas Berger's Little Big Man as a parody not only of Old West mythology, but of other myths as well.

It is a Western to end all Westerns, with all the Western's clichés neatly reversed into something quite new.¹

It is, of course, a satire on Westerns, told with high humor.²

Berger has in some manner put together a variety of techniques and infused them with a spirit so that .. . it is a functional and successful piece of literature. It is one of the best of American Western novels.³

If Buster Keaton had been a novelist, he might have written Little Big Man.⁴

This sampling of reactions to Thomas Berger's Little Big Man indicates the variety...