Criticism > Contemporary Literary Criticism > Davies, (William) Robertson (Vol. 25) - Joyce Carol Oates

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JOYCE CAROL OATES

[The] experience of reading One Half of Roberston Davies was enlightening—I was forced to realize how close, how astonishingly close, colossal vanity is to pristine innocence. (p. 24)

Of these 22 pieces perhaps five are worth preserving; the others, particularly a "satirical" poem on Hair, not to mention a coy, cute animal story written for children but included here because "several people" assured Davies it was really for adults, might have been tossed away without regret. The collection improves as it progresses, though this may be a consequence of Davies's choice of subject matter (Freud, Jung, Trollope, melodrama, ghost stories, Proust, etc.) rather than the actual quality of his writing…. On Dickens he writes knowledgeably, if without any particular genius; on Jung he is disappointingly simplistic, and makes statements I would challenge—"For Jung," Davies says, "God was a fact for which evidence existed in the mind...

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1. Introduction
2. Arnold Edinborough
3. Peter Baltensperger
4. Walter E. Swayze
5. Joyce Carol Oates
6. Patricia Monk
7. Sam Solecki
8. John Harris
9. John Kenneth Galbraith
10. Patricia Monk
11. Copyright

1. Joyce Carol Oates