The Oxford companion to American literature

For over fifty years, James D. Hart's The Oxford Companion to American Literature has served as an essential guide to America's literary culture, showcasing the nation's rich history of influential writers. The sixth edition has been thoroughly revised to reflect developments in American literature since 1982. Editors James D. Hart and Phillip Leininger have updated entries on established authors like Saul Bellow, Norman Mailer, and Joyce Carol Oates, while introducing over 180 new entries on contemporary novelists, poets, playwrights, popular writers, historians, naturalists, and literary critics. This edition emphasizes diverse voices, adding luminaries such as Charlotte Perkins Gilman, M.F.K. Fisher, and Ursula Le Guin. With over 5,000 entries, the Companion maintains a dynamic balance between historical and contemporary literature, covering aspects from the Pulitzer Prize to pulp fiction, and from Walt Whitman to William F. Buckley, Jr. It includes over 2,000 biographical profiles of significant American authors and foreign writers, along with more than 1,100 summaries of important literary works. The new edition also provides historical context and insightful commentary on literary movements, awards, and related topics. Thoroughly cross-referenced and featuring an updated index, this edition is both accurate and comprehensive, appealing to casual readers and serious scholars alike.