Campus Fictions: Exemption and the American Campus Novel

Campus Fictions argues that the academic novel balances utopian and regressive tendencies, reinforcing the crises we face in higher learning while simultaneously signposting hope for a worn institution. Whether a bestseller such as Erich Segal ’s romance Love Story (1970) or wonkier fare such as Don DeLillo’s White Noise (1985), the academic novel mystifies the academy not only to a wide public but also—worse—to readers who might describe themselves as sympathetic to higher learning. The bo...