Perspectives on Barry Hannah

Perspectives on Barry Hannah edited by Martyn Bone with contributions by Melanie R. Benson, Thomas Aervold Bjerre, Martyn Bone, Mark S. Graybill, Richard E. Lee, Kenneth Millard, James B. Potts III, Scott Romine, Matthew Shipe, and Daniel E. Williams Perspectives on Barry Hannah is a collection of essays devoted to the work of the award-winning fiction writer Barry Hannah. The anthology features a broad range of critical approaches and covers the span of Hannahs career from Geronimo Rex (1972) to Yonder Stands Your Orphan (2001). The book also includes a previously unpublished interview with Hannah. Taken together, the ten essays cover all of Hannahs thirteen published books. The contributors give fresh perspectives on Hannahs classic works (Airships and Ray), provide illuminating readings of important fiction that has received less critical attention (Nightwatchmen, Hey Jack!, and Never Die), and offer the first sustained criticism on Hannahs acclaimed later fiction (Bats Out of Hell, High Lonesome, and Yonder Stands Your Orphan). As Martyn Bone explains in his introduction, the essays-though varied in approach and style-consistently hone in on the recurrent themes that characterize Hannahs career: his relationship to postmodernism; his interrogation of traditional ideas of masculinity and heroism; his complex engagement with southern history, literature, and culture; and his growing concern with spirituality and morality. The essays in Perspectives on Barry Hannah make connections between Hannahs work and that of several prominent modern and postmodern authors, including William Faulkner, Ernest Hemingway, James Joyce, Allen Tate, John Irving, J. M. Coatzee, and Cormac McCarthy. Contributors also consider Hannahs fiction in relation to nonliterary cultural forms such as sport, film, and popular music. Ultimately, Perspectives on Barry Hannah affirms Hannahs status as a leading figure in contemporary American literature. Martyn Bone is assistant professor of American literature at the Institute for English, German, and Romance Languages at the University of Copenhagen.