West of Everything: The Inner Life of Westerns

by Jane Tompkins

Book Overview

A leading figure in the debate over the literary canon, Jane Tompkins was one of the first to point to the ongoing relevance of popular women's fiction in the 19th century, long overlooked or scorned by literary critics. Now, in West of Everything, Tompkins shows how popular novels and films of the American west have shaped the emotional lives of people in our time.
Into this world full of violence and manly courage, the world of John Wayne and...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0195082680
• ISBN13: 9780195082685
• Release Date: April 1993
• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Length: 272 Pages
• Weight: 0.55 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.4" x 8.6"

Customer Reviews

Yee- Ha!

An interesting look at Westerns from personal and literary perspectives. Focuses attention on a rich genre that has not been looked at enough by the fields of literary criticism and literature.

Home On the Range

Tompkins is infuriatingly cutting-edge, but in the end she's just a gal who likes men in jeans serving up piping hot pork and beans. She writes an accessible prose, none of that academic trash prose. She's old school. There's lots of lefty, snotty condescension, but also a sound love for the great American genre. Tompkins treats the bread and butter pulp classics of the Western genre as literature with a capital L. Why not? She persuades us that there is gold in them thare hills.

wow!

This is an amazing book. Jane Tompkins looks at the different symbols in westerns -- cattle, horses, food, work -- and discusses what they *mean*. She also discusses the evolution of the genre -- where it came from, and what it was a reaction to, and why the different symbols work together so well. And all the while, her writing style is engaging and interesting and pulls you along as you nod and say "Oh! Right!" You don't have to be a student of writing to enjoy this book. The information translates immediately to male-female communication, and to interactions you may have with colleagues. You'll find yourself gutting through some project and saying in a John Wayne accent "well, it's the cowboy way, ain't it?"Highly enjoyable. An amazing piece of work.