Flaubert, Joyce and Beckett: The Stoic Commedians »

Stoics, says literary critic Kenner (1923-2003), are people who recognize that the possibilities available to them, however large or small, are finite. He counts novelists among them in an era when narrative was limited by the letters in the alphabet and whatever meaning readers can garner with only their eyes, and counts the three writers are stoic comedians because they laughed at the prison that confined them. The long essay has neither index or bibliography. The 1962 edition was published by Beacon Press. Annotation ©2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR