Harrison, Jim | Keith Opdahl (essay date 1979)
Keith Opdahl (essay date 1979)
SOURCE: "Junk Food," in The Nation, New York, Vol. 229, No. 1, July 7, 1979, pp. 23-4.
[Keith Opdahl is an American critic and author. In the following review of Legends of the Fall, he praises stylistic aspects of Harrison's novellas but challenges his depiction of the plight of the American male.]
It's as though William Butler Yeats had written a scenario for Sam Peckinpah. Or as though James Dickey had done a Western—though Dickey wraps the violence in Deliverance in a context that attempts to explain and redeem it, while Jim Harrison gives the pure, raw, macho daydream. Harrison's three long stories are full of silent men and lovely women who desire to be ravaged. The bad guys are nightmare figures with names like "Slats" who just won't listen to reason. You have to zap them hard.
What is it about these purely evil characters? Do we turn to them because of their simplicity?...
[The entire page is 1516 words long]
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