E.L. Doctorow's Ragtime (Bloom's Guides) [Hardcover]

Harold Bloom (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 2004 | Series: Bloom's Guides

E.L. Doctorow's Ragtime, part of Chelsea House Publishers' Bloom's Guides collection, presents concise critical excerpts from Ragtime to provide a scholarly overview of the work. This comprehensive study guide also features "The Story Behind the Story," which details the conditions under which Ragtime was written. This title also includes a short biography on Doctorow and a descriptive list of characters.

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Grade 10 Up-Written by scholars or literary experts, these essays discuss Doctorow's use of illusion and mirrors, music as a metaphor, the American dream, the boy narrator, the book's autobiographical elements, Ragtime as a tale of race and property, its historical figures and fictional characters, women's roles, the use of foreshadowing, and many other topics. Authors of individual chapters pick apart Ragtime for underlying meanings and facts, and it is interesting to see how several critics view it from different perspectives. This is the type of novel that is open to interpretation and students will gain a better understanding from reading all of the discussion. Doctorow is quoted in several chapters. Students looking for criticism and analysis of literary works will find it easy to use this title rather than searching endlessly for the journals in which these articles may have originally appeared. A valuable resource for literature collections.
Pat Bender, The Shipley School, Bryn Mawr, PA
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 100 pages
• Publisher: Chelsea House Pub (L) (March 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0791078809
• ISBN-13: 978-0791078808
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.1 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,714,933 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

E. L. Doctorow's novels include The March, City of God, The Waterworks, Welcome to Hard Times, The Book of Daniel, Ragtime, Loon Lake, Lives of the Poets, World's Fair, and Billy Bathgate. His work has been published in thirty-two languages. Among his honors are the National Book Award, three National Book Critics Circle awards, two PEN/Faulkner awards, the Edith Wharton Citation for Fiction, the William Dean Howells Medal of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and the presidentially conferred National Humanities Medal. E. L. Doctorow lives in New York.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars If only all books were this great!, May 10, 2008

By 

An admirer of Saul "Mr Wobble" (uk) - See all my reviews

This review is from: E.L. Doctorow's Ragtime (Bloom's Modern Critical Interpretations) (Library Binding)

This book is exceptional. It is one of those books that rivets your mind; makes you realize how ordinary other books are by comparison.Sentence builds on sentence creating fantastic images making this book a joy to the senses.
Doctorow brilliantly recreates the Ragtime era using actual events and people from the time and interweaving with three fictional families;one WASP, Tateh and his daughter who are poor jewish migrants, and Coalhouse Walkers entanglement with the WASP family.
I normally condemn books written about the past as 'unauthentic' or 'lacking the realism' of the age discribed. 'Ragtime' and Doctorow show me that I was talking out of my hat! This really is superb. Anyone giving this less than 5 stars must be a green with envy writer wishing they could write like E L Doctorow!