Edward L. Galligan
Areas of special interest: comedy and humor, American literature, the novel,
science and literary criticism, language, popular culture, journalism.
Publications
- A Choice of Days by H. L. Mencken, edited with an
introduction, Knopf, 1980. Reprinted, Vintage Books, 1981.
- The Comic Vision in Literature, University of Georgia Press, 1984.
Since I retired in January, 1989 most of what I have written has been
published in
The Sewanee Review. That includes four
critical essays on contemporary novelists:
- "Three Times Three: The Novels of Robertson Davies,"Winter, 1990
- "Getting It Right: The Novels of George V. Higgins," Spring, 1992
- "Telling the Truth: The Novels of Josef Skvorecky," Winter, 1993
- "The Novels of Mary Lee Settle," forthcoming
I have done review-essays on recently published biographies:
- "Biographies and Biographers," Spring, 1993
- "American Originals," forthcoming.
- I did a critical essay in response to Tony Judt's Past
Imperfect: French Intellectuals, 1944-56 - entitled "Comforting
Falsehoods, Inconvenient Truths," Summer, 1993; and
- an essay on the American language entitled (originally) "Smile
When You Say That, Pardner," forthcoming.
I have also done -- for the Sewanee Review --
three essays in response to recent works by
scientists:
- "Literary Crticism and The Emperor's New
Mind" (a book by the physicist Roger Penrose), Winter, 1991
- "Making Sense of the Mind" (a response to Bright Air,
Brilliant Fire by Gerald W. Edelman), Spring, 1994; and
- "More on the Matter of the Mind" (a response to The Chemistry
of Conscious States by J. Allan Hobson), forthcoming.
In Winter, 1996 I was given
the Robert B. Heilman Award for Excellence in Book Reviewing in The Sewanee
Review in 1995.
People are welcome to send me email.
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Last updated: April 10, 1996
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