From Publishers Weekly
Author of the deeply satirical novel JR (which features an 11-year-old capitalist who trumps up his Army surplus company in a manner that seems eerily prescient today) and of The Recognitions, Gaddis (1922-1998) was a fact-checker at the New Yorker and a corporate speech-writer before coming to prominence, but published very little essay-based work. Editor Joseph Tabbi here collects 29 short and occasional pieces, some left in manuscript at the time of Gaddis's death, others admiring encomiums to Saul Bellow or Julian Schnabel, all of which, as he notes, "create a sense of the environment in which Gaddis worked."Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Criticism is integral to William Gaddis' (1922-98) referential fiction, and he also wrote tonic critical essays spiked with a parodic wit, never-before-collected and invaluable works that Gaddis scholar Joseph Tabbi ably sets in literary and biographical context. Gaddis is particularly rousing in his skewering of the corporate world, a realm he infiltrated while writing for Eastman Kodak and IBM, and he takes on with equal mettle the Protestant work ethic and its shaping of the military-industrial complex, and the plight of art in a culture of pragmatism. Fascinated and appalled by the complexity, hypocrisy, and fever of American life, Gaddis concludes that we're all in this craziness together, "we are all in the same line of business: that of concocting, arranging, and peddling fictions to get us safely through the night." Donna Seaman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Book Description
William Gaddis published only four novels during his lifetime, but with those works he earned himself a reputation as one of America's greatest novelists. Less well known is Gaddis's body of excellent critical writings. Here is a wide range of his original essays, some published for the first time. From "'Stop Player. Joke No. 4,'" Gaddis's first national publication and the basis for his projected history of the player piano, to the title essay about missed opportunities in America during the past fifty years, to "Old Foes with New Faces," an examination of the relationship between the writer and the problem of religion-this diverse collection displays the power of an autonomous literary intelligence in an age increasingly dominated by political and religious conservatism.

About the Author
William Gaddis (1922-1998) was the author of four novels, two of which, J R and A Frolic of His Own, won the National Book Award. He was a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the recipient of a MacArthur Prize.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

William Gaddis published four novels during his lifetime, and with those works he earned a reputation as one of America's greatest novelists, the heir to Joyce and Nabokov. Less well known is Gaddis's body of perceptive critical writings. Here is a selection of his incisive essays, some published for the first time. From "Stop Player. Joke No. 4," Gaddis's first national publication and the basis for his projected history of the player piano to an essay on Samuel Butler's Utopian novel Erewhon, from the title essay about missed opportunities in America during the past fifty years to "Old Foes with New Faces," an essay on the relationship between the writer and religion, this diverse collection is a vital testament to the unquenchable curiosity and far-ranging scope of this innovative writer's mind.

FROM THE CRITICS

Publishers Weekly

Author of the deeply satirical novel JR (which features an 11-year-old capitalist who trumps up his Army surplus company in a manner that seems eerily prescient today) and of The Recognitions, Gaddis (1922-1998) was a fact-checker at the New Yorker and a corporate speech-writer before coming to prominence, but published very little essay-based work. Editor Joseph Tabbi here collects 29 short and occasional pieces, some left in manuscript at the time of Gaddis's death, others admiring encomiums to Saul Bellow or Julian Schnabel, all of which, as he notes, "create a sense of the environment in which Gaddis worked." (Oct.) Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews

The great novelist (Agape Agape, p. 1053, etc.) explores his fascination with machines, greed, violence, and art in odd bits of nonfiction, some appearing in print for the first time.

Gaddis (1922￯﾿ﾽ98) never hesitated from targeting the nation￯﾿ﾽs economic elite in his densely packed fiction, and his essays are no different. For example, in a piece that first appeared in the New York Times Book Review in 1995, he has no trouble linking Newt Gringrich￯﾿ﾽs Contract with America to Samuel Butler￯﾿ﾽs 1872 utopian novel, Erewhon. Both Butler and Gingrich, he argues, predicate their passion for law and order on stamping out difference, and their intent resembles the function of most technology, another Gaddis obsession. In an essay written as a script for an IBM promotional film, he writes that a player piano performs its music as beautifully as a real player might, raising the question of the artist￯﾿ﾽs purpose, but it also leaves one feeling cold, because ultimately the same humans replaced by the piano are the sources of, and the ones listening to, the music. There￯﾿ﾽs a connection here between Gaddis￯﾿ﾽs criticism of the Contract with America and of the player piano; both beget an alienated and usually underserved audience. The title piece argues that this audience, the American public, has opted for second place: the good life as defined by status and three square meals a day. Instead of holding fast to the Protestant work ethic that views material success as tantamount to goodness, Gaddis would prefer Americans to work on goodness and let the material success follow. Will the business leaders of American society ever make this transformation? On that point, the author is cynical. Joseph Tabbiprovides an excellent introduction and biographical background that￯﾿ﾽs particularly helpful in a collection that spans 50 years.