Mythic Mailer in An American Dream: Difference between revisions

{{byline|last=Hampton|first=Jill}}

{{notice|We have identified the central myth literature, in its narrative aspect, with the quest-myth. Now if we wish to see this central myth as a pattern of meaning also, we have to start with the workings of the subconscious where the epiphany originates, in other words in the dream. (Northrop Frye, 684) and reprinted here with the permission of the author.}}

<blockquote>To begin with, the book is absolutely a myth--I'm trying to create a modern myth, (Conversations with Norman Mailer, 102)</blockquote>

Norman Mailer's book ''<u>An American Dream</u>'' has been acclaimed by many critics, including the author himself, as possibly his finest novel. On the other hand, many scholars have attacked it for its unrealistic plotline and unbelievable characters. Reviews of the book were decidedly mixed. Life magazine call it "by conventional standards...a grotesquely implausible book, full of horrific occurrences and characters who appear to uniformly insane" (12). On the positive side, Joan Didion claimed "''<u>An American Dream</u>'' is one more instance in which Mailer is going to laugh last, for it is a remarkable book"(39). Mailer scholar J. Michael Lennon writes that " The book's defenders, with few exceptions, [have] tended to see the novel as myth, fantasy, or allegory" (9).