Ronnie Dugger

A remarkably important milestone in modern Texas literature. In the cover article, Larry McMurtry revisits his essay “Southwestern Literature?” from In a Narrow Grave and concludes that, contrary to his confident predictions in 1968, Texas had still failed to produce a literature worthy of note. The uproar set off by his skewering of the Holy Trinity (Bedichek, Webb, and Dobie), and such notables as Katherine Anne Porter, Donald Barthelme, William Goyen, Larry L. King, A. C. Greene (whom McMurtry dismisses as a critic), Preston Jones, and a raft of others, led to a weekend-long Texas Literary Tradition conference at the University of Texas two years later, and, twenty-six years after publication, still provides a damning yet lively critique of literature and Texas, two subjects which have always co-existed uneasily.… (altro)