The Literary Bent: In Search of High Art in Contemporary American Writing

What is "literature in these postmodern, postcanonical times? And if a small number of works being written today are "literary," what distinguishes them from those many others that are not? The store managers who shelve books in separate "literature" and "fiction" sections clearly have something in mind, but they're not talking. James Bloom has his own ideas, and he is.

With zest and conviction, Bloom argues that traditional aspirations to literariness persist in the poetry and fiction of wr...