1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910827805203321

Titolo

Best of times, worst of times : contemporary American short stories from the new Gilded Age / / edited by Wendy Martin and Cecelia Tichi

Pubbl/distr/stampa

New York ; ; London : , : New York University Press, , [2011]

©2011

ISBN

0-8147-6300-6

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource

Disciplina

813.0108054

Soggetti

Short stories, American

American fiction - 21st century

United States Social life and customs Fiction

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Nota di contenuto

Your mother and I / Dave Eggers -- Ballad of Duane Jaurez / Tom Franklin -- In the American society / Gish Jen -- Gogol / Jhumpa Lahiri -- Refresh, refresh / Benjamin Percy -- Smorgasbord / Tobias Wolfe -- How to date a brown girl (black girl, white girl, or halfie) / Junot Diaz -- In the cemetery where Al Jolson is buried / Amy Hempel -- Metamorphosis / John Updike -- Think / David Foster Wallace -- Expensive trips nowhere / Tom Bissell -- Near-extinct birds of the central Cordillera / Ben Fountain -- Shiloh / Bobbie Ann Mason -- COMMCOMM / George Saunders -- Mines / Susan Straight -- Skinless / Aimee Bender -- View from a headlock / Jonathan Lethem -- Brownies / Zz Packer -- Pie of the month / Jean Thompson -- Day / Charles Bukowski -- Scales / Louise Erdrich -- Something that needs nothing / Miranda July -- Equal opportunity / Walter Mosley -- Passenger / Marisa Silver.

Sommario/riassunto

Late twentieth and early twenty-first century America has been labeled as “The New Gilded Age,” a phrase that embodies the glitz and glamour of one of the wealthiest countries in the world but also suggests the greed, corruption, and inequalities teeming just below the surface. Identifying some of the sparkling moments of humanity interwoven between the moments of crisis, Best of Times, Worst of Times features



short stories by such renowned writers as Junot Diaz, George Saunders, Jhumpa Lahiri, Tobias Wolff, and many others, whose distinctive authorial voices lend urgency and a sense of heightened awareness to the modern moment. Commenting on and making sense of what is going on in America today, fractured as it is by two ongoing wars, the aftermath of 9/11, Hurricane Katrina, and the worst economic collapse since the Great Depression, these stories speak to some of the most germane issues confronting America today, from race relations, immigration, and social class to gender issues, Iraq, and imperialism. These expertly culled, emotionally powerful stories provide the perfect mirror with which to examine the real state of the union.