SOURCE: “‘No Place to Hide’: Biographical and Critical Backgrounds,” in Wright Morris Revisited, Twayne Publishers, 1998, pp. 1-17.

In the following excerpt from the introductory chapter of Wright Morris Revisited, Wydeven offers a thumbnail summation of Morris's major themes and techniques.

Throughout his active career, spanning the half century from 1942 to 1991 (when he stopped writing) and more than 30 books of fiction, commentary, and photo-text, Wright Morris remained resolutely independent, gradually establishing respectable reputations as both writer and photographer. He has resisted labeling as a realist or as a regionalist, and his experimentation has sometimes made his work difficult; he has insisted, particularly in his photo-texts and in his often extraordinarily visual prose, that readers be willing to cross generic borders, attend closely to detail, and draw conclusions from carefully crafted evidence.

Morris is less a storyteller than a brooder on stories he has already told. His work often has...