Criticism > Contemporary Literary Criticism > Doctorow, E. L. - Michael Wutz (review date Spring 1995)

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Michael Wutz (review date Spring 1995)

SOURCE: A review of The Waterworks, in Review of Contemporary Fiction, Vol. 15, No. 1, Spring, 1995, pp. 177-78.

[In the following review, Wutz outlines the elements of The Waterworks and considers its place in Doctorow's oeuvre.]

An almost uncanny ability to reconstruct historical material and a spellbinding facility to tell a good tale—these are the qualities that have made E. L. Doctorow one of America's most distinguished literary practitioners and the qualities that are again evident in The Waterworks, a fascinating science-detection mystery centered in post-bellum New York City. Framed by the atmospherics of a city bulging out of its seams, the novel tells the story of young Martin Pemberton, a caustic free-lance literary critic, who claims to have seen his deceased father in a city omnibus. The ensuing search, told in the form of a memoir by a newspaper editor named...

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1. Introduction
2. Principal Works
3. Criticism
   1. Wirt Williams (review date 25 September 1960)
   2. Gwendolyn Brooks (review date 10 July 1966)
   3. Stanley Kauffman (review date 5 June 1971)
   4. Joseph Catinella (review date 17 July 1971)
   5. Patrick Parrinder (review date 4 April 1985)
   6. Richard D. Beards (review date Summer 1985)
   7. Marvin J. LaHood (review date Winter 1987)
   8. Michelle M. Tokarczyk (essay date Fall 1987)
   9. John G. Parks (essay date Winter 1991)
   10. Derek Wright (essay date 1993)
   11. Stephen Matterson (essay date Winter 1993)
   12. Stephen Cooper (essay date May 1993)
   13. Ann V. Miller (essay date Summer 1993)
   14. Stephen Fender (review date 27 May 1994)
   15. John Whitworth (review date 28 May 1994)
   16. Jonathan Franzen (review date 19 June 1994)
   17. Simon Schama (review date 19 June 1994)
   18. Mark Shechner (review date 10 July 1994)
   19. Andrew Delbanco (review date 18 July 1994)
   20. William Hutchings (review date Winter 1995)
   21. E. L. Doctorow with Michelle M. Tokarczyk (interview date Winter 1995)
   22. Michael Wutz (review date Spring 1995)
4. Further Reading
5. Copyright

1. E. L. Doctorow