In praise of… American women writers

"The frenzied, and probably deluded, quest for the holy grail of literature, the Great American Novel, is one conducted by males. And quite macho ones at that. They are writers who marry models, run for political office, or who carry sawn-off shot guns in the front of their car. They are permanently engaged in acts of self-celebration. No other writers seem to exist, and when John Updike died, Ian McEwan declared the end, no less, of the golden age of the American novel. Except it isn't. Annie Proulx, Anne Tyler, Marilynne Robinson, Jane Smiley, Joyce Carol Oates, Jayne Anne Phillips, Bobbie Ann Mason and Gish Jen are eight women selected by our Review section today who can lay claim to be some of the best novelists writing in America today."More