The contributions in this book draw attention to the close, though sometimes ambiguous, relationship between biography, aesthetics, ideology, social critique and gender in Dos Passos’s writings. Most of the essays are important additions to the ongoing scholarly critique on the author’s works, considered in terms of innovative literary techniques and the myriad of literary representations, as well as of core thematic issues that have helped define Dos Passos both as a towering figure of American Modernism, and outspoken political and social critic.
Further to scrutinizing Dos Passos’s biographic aspects and literary innovations, the book also offers invaluable insights into the historiographical, ideological and social dimensions of the American (and to some extent European) society of the time, dominated by unprecedented social and political instability that shattered the ‘American Dream’ of liberty and egalitarianism, and by international warfare.
The present collection of essays is a worthy contribution to the growing body of critical studies on John Dos Passos’s writings, which indisputably endorse the status of his literary name.
