American Literature: American Novelists

From The Cambridge Guide to Women's Writing in English
Edith Wharton's Pulitzer-Prize-winning novel describes the disillusionment of its thoughtful, conformist hero with the stifling manners and mores of 19th-century New York society. MORE

From The Cambridge Guide to Literature in English
A novel by Sinclair Lewis, published in 1922. It depicts the complacency and materialism of George F. Babbitt, a real-estate agent and representative middle-class family man from the city of Zenith in the American Midwest. MORE

From Brewer's Curious Titles
A novel (1961) by Joseph Heller (1923-99) about the experiences of Captain Yossarian of the 256th United States (Army) bombing squadron in Italy during the Second World War. MORE

From The Cambridge Guide to Literature in English
The only novel by the American writer Margaret Mitchell (1900-49), published in 1936 and awarded the Pulitzer Prize in the following year. An immediate best-seller, it has sold more than 25 million copies, been translated into 27 languages and inspired an enduringly popular film. MORE

From The Hutchinson Unabridged Encyclopedia
Non-fiction novel (1965) by US writer Truman Capote. Subtitled ‘A True Account of a Multiple Murder and its Consequences’, it was based on interviews and tells of the murder of a Kansas farming family in 1959. MORE

From The Cambridge Guide to Literature in English
A novel by Herman Melville, published in New York and London in 1851. The British title was The Whale. The highly complex story begins with the narrator Ishmael's decision to go to sea. MORE

From The Hutchinson Unabridged Encyclopedia
Novel (1876) by US author Mark Twain. It describes the childhood escapades of Tom Sawyer and his friends Huckleberry Finn and Joe Harper in a small Mississippi community before the Civil War. MORE

From The Cambridge Guide to Children's Books in English
Novel by J.D. Salinger (1919-), about adolescence rather than for adolescents, and widely seen as a precursor of (or to blame for) probably the most common form of writing for young adults. MORE

From The Cambridge Guide to Literature in English
A novel by John Steinbeck, published in 1939 and awarded a Pulitzer Prize the following year. The novel tells the story of Oklahoma farmers who are driven off their land by soil erosion. MORE

From The Cambridge Guide to Literature in English
A novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald, published in 1925.
The narrator, Nick Carraway, rents a cottage in West Egg, Long Island, next door to the mansion of Jay Gatsby and across the water from the home of Tom Buchanan and his wife Daisy, Carraway's cousin. MORE

From The Cambridge Guide to Literature in English
A novel by Ernest Hemingway, published in 1926. The English edition which appeared the following year was entitled Fiesta. Set in the mid-1920s, it deals with the ‘lost generation’ of American and British expatriates who have settled in Paris, depicted here as a moral wasteland of drunkenness and promiscuity. MORE

From The Hutchinson Unabridged Encyclopedia
Novel by the US writer Harper Lee (born 1926) published in 1960. Set in a small town in Alabama in the 1930s, it is a dramatic depiction of racial tension and prejudice. MORE

U.S. novelist, noted for her children's books, especially Little Women (1869). MORE

U.S. writer; his novels include Other Voices, Other Rooms (1948) and In Cold Blood (1964), based on an actual multiple murder. MORE

1897-1962, US novelist, short-story writer, and poet; noted for The Sound and the Fury (1929) and As I Lay Dying (1930); Nobel prize for literature 1949. MORE

(Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald), 1896–1940, American novelist and short-story writer, b. St. Paul, Minn. He is ranked among the great American novelists. MORE

U.S. novelist and short-story writer. His novels include The Sun Also Rises (1926), A Farewell to Arms (1929), For Whom the Bell Tolls (1940), and The Old Man and the Sea (1952): Nobel prize for literature 1954. MORE

Writer, born in Portland, Maine, USA. He graduated from his state university and continued to live in Maine, at first supporting himself with odd jobs while establishing his writing career. MORE

1819–91, American author, b. New York City, considered one of the great American writers and a major figure in world literature. MORE

(2/18/1931–) Novels, criticism; editor In 1993, Toni Morrison became the first black woman to receive the Nobel Prize for literature. MORE

has gained prominence and cultlike acclaim from a large cross section of the American public on the basis of a rather limited literary output-one novel, three collections of novellas and short stories, and several additional uncollected short stories. MORE

1902–68, American writer, b. Salinas, Calif., studied at Stanford. He is probably best remembered for his strong sociological novel The Grapes of Wrath. MORE

U.S. novelist and humorist, famous for his classics The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876) and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885). MORE

American writer whose works include the novels Meridian (1976) and The Color Purple (1982), for which she won a Pulitzer Prize. MORE