James Wilcox

The first and so far only James Wilcox work I have read. Understated, charming prose which reserves its greatest affection for the Louisiana landscape. Its people are rendered as grotesques, albeit with a deft and sensitive touch. The book is without plot, although not necessarily to its detriment, and certainly not without tension. No real ending, and no real profundity. A young Joyce pulled it off in Dubliners, this sort of "superficially superficial" social observation, but Wilcox doesn't quite crack it. There may be very little at the heart of this book beyond the talented traducing of the young writer's home and upbringing, to please the metropolitan readership to which he aspired. It is very gentle all the same. Not unenjoyable, and short.… (mer)