“In a world where the imagined purpose of the novel is to entertain—not to teach or spark further inquiry—The Last Samurai dissents.”

Lee Konstantinou
Lee Konstantinou is associate professor of English at the University of Maryland. His books include the novel Pop Apocalypse (2009) and the literary history Cool Characters: Irony and American Fiction (2016).
Helen DeWitt, Hand to Mouth
Is Helen DeWitt a genius? Readers familiar with the author’s fiction will not find this question out of line. Genius is a word that comes quickly to the lips of ...
The Yurt of Fiction
This summer, George Saunders wrote that Donald Trump had given him a gift. Saunders had been traveling across the country, attending Trump rallies ...