Burning Down the House: Essays on Fiction [Hardcover]

Charles Baxter (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 1, 1997

In this book, Baxter offers several sharp, articulate, and provocative essays that examine the many forces currently shaping contemporary American fiction. As noted in The Washington Times: "What elevates this collection from the status of technical manual (which it also is, and a brilliant one at that) is Mr. Baxter's rare ability to gauge the capacities of fiction for conveying an image not only of individual existence, but of the characteristic feel of a time, a culture, a way of life."

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

For fiction lovers, history and social commentary on the genre is a thought-provoking addition to reading. Novelist Charles Baxter's essays on contemporary fiction dissect the connections between life, values, and art with unerring and insightful precision. Baxter compares the dysfunction in contemporary fiction to the removal of the villain from politics. He decries the prostituting of epiphany as a commercial product that turns fiction into a pseudo-instruction manual, and he reveals the magic within Donald Barthelme's innovative prose, created with a generosity "almost unseen" in American letters. This is a powerful companion to Baxter's short story collections.

From Library Journal

Baxter, a novelist (Shadow Play, LJ 12/92), short story author, self-described ex-poet, and instructor of writing, has revised lectures he originally gave for a MFA program, addressing storytelling concerns dear to his heart. Baxter uses a quote from Richard Nixon as the point of departure in his first essays to explore how "deniability" has crept even into contemporary writing, robbing it of its interest and complexity. Baxter makes a strong case for reviving narratives with "mindful villainy" and an "imaginative grip on the despicable." Elsewhere, Baxter delves into the short fiction of Alice Walker, Flannery O'Connor, and James Joyce to trace shadows of the antagonist and defends the "guilty pleasures" of this "unserious" mode now fallen out of fashion. While Baxter can sometimes sound like a rule-wagging schoolmaster, there is a freshness to his roundabout method of deflating cliches taught at writing programs; his work will appeal to serious writers and readers of fiction.?Amy Boaz, "Library Journal"
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 245 pages
• Publisher: Graywolf Press; First Edition edition (March 1, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 155597256X
• ISBN-13: 978-1555972561
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.4 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,539,587 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

36 of 37 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A fiction writer's view of contemporary fiction, May 26, 2000

By 

Doug Vaughn - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Burning Down the House: Essays on Fiction (Hardcover)

Burning Down the House: Essays on Fiction by Charles Baxter is a refreshingly broad take on a number of issues facing writers and readers of serious fiction today. The title reminds me of a story Harry Crews once told concerning his early days learning the craft of fiction. He had given an early story to his teacher, Alan Tate, and when he asked what Tate thought of it he got the reply that "Fire is a great purifier" - so went home, burned his story and started over. Baxter seems to want to burn away a lot of what has come to dominate the literary scene. He bemoans the lack of real antagonists and villians in what he refers to as "dysfunctional" fiction. He decries the passive voice and ambiguos tone that writing in which no one is really accountable (which he blames largely on the polictical rhetoric of Nixon, Reagan,and Busch which he says has robbed the public of the proper 'story' of the last few decades).

This book of essays is enjoyable on a number of levels. One of my favorite chapters is the one in which he contrasts fiction writers with poets. This chapter is full of broad and exaggerated generalizations (which he has foretold and apologized for in advance) which are both thought provoking and often very funny. The chapter on melodrama is also very insightful and harking back to an earlier essay about dysfunctional fiction in which the characters are all victims and no one is a clear protagonist or antagonist, he shows how pure evil (a clear cut villian) is the essential ingrediant in melodrama and that is why melodrama continues to interest readers while lots of serious fiction doesn't register. He further shows how melodrama underpins some of the great fiction - using Chekov, that most unmelodramatic writer, as an example.

I really enjoyed this book and read it at one sitting - which is probably not good. There is so much that is thought provoking in these essays that they deserve more time and a lot of rumination. I highly recommend it for anyone interested in serious fiction today. It will give you a lot to think about.

20 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Writer's Writer, May 6, 1997

By A Customer

This review is from: Burning Down the House: Essays on Fiction (Hardcover)

I have had the amazing fortune to study with Mr. Baxter as his student at the University of Michigan where he is director of the MFA Program in Creative Writing. I have taken classes taught by this man, I consider him a friend. In my humble opinion he is the finest instructor of the craft of writing that I have ever known.
On top of that, his fiction is some of the most thoughtful, controlled and refined work that is being produced in the English language, period. Knowing that I would think that anyone with an even remote interest in writing would like to pick his brain. I have had that opportunity (to a limited extent) here at the University. But now, with this wonderful book, beautifully written, anyone can venture into the mind of this master of the craft. It's like having an entire semster of Charlie's best sayings, ideas and thoughts on writing in a nicely bound and clearly written little package.
The fact of the matter is that this book goes on a writer's shelf between White's ELEMENTS OF STYLE and Gardener's ART OF FICTION. Like those two masterful volumes this new work is essential to what Charlie fondly calls "A writer's bag o' tricks." The essay RHYMING ACTION, by itself, would be worth the price of the book. In short, the work has become an essential text book for me, filled with both lively wit and precise instruction on not only the craft of a writer, but the life of a writer as well. I cannot stress enough the importance of this book

17 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The best of the best, October 23, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Burning Down the House: Essays on Fiction (Paperback)

Any writer, anywhere, needs to read this book. I assign it to undergraduate and graduate students alike. Charles Baxter explores essential elements of fiction here, and has some surprising, convincing new ideas. He writes in a witty, reflective, fascinating voice that makes these essays a pleasure to read.

Reading this book transforms people's writing, deepening their approach and understanding. Take a look at his ideas about counterpointed characters, or about what replaces the idea of "conflict" in fiction.

An amazing, brilliant book.