The Questions that Matter Most: Reading, Writing, and the Exercise of Freedom
By
Jane Smiley has long been acclaimed as one of America’s preeminent novelists. Less known is her nonfiction, her steady and penetrating essays on some of the aesthetic and cultural issues that mark any serious engagement with reading and writing. Her approach is both enthusiastic and meticulous, always quick to dive beneath surface-level interpretations of authors and their work. This volume of nonfiction begins with a personal introduction that traces Smiley’s migration from Iowa to California a quarter-century ago. She soon found herself grappling with the rich and varied literature of a state whose writers were engaging with a contested history of race, class, identity, and sex. As she considers the ambiguity of character and the weight of history, her essays provide new entry points into literature, and we lucky readers can see how Smiley draws inspiration from across literary history to invigorate her own writing. Among the authors she examines are Marguerite de Navarre, Charles Dickens, Anthony Trollope, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Louisa May Alcott, Mark Twain, Willa Cather, Franz Kafka, Halldor Laxness, and Jessica Mitford. Throughout, Smiley seeks to think harder and, in her words, with “more clarity and nuance” about the questions that matter most.
Reviews
"Pulitzer Prize winner Smiley dives into the landscapes where much of her work is set—and the writing of authors who have redefined the novel. Smiley’s voraciousness as a reader drives the book, which is peppered with insights into Charles Dickens, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Louisa May Alcott, Willa Cather, Franz Kafka, and others." Alta Journal
"The prescient questions Smiley addresses are angled at California and American literary history through the work of a cohort of seminal writers [...] The ambiguity of the Golden State in terms of freedom, autonomy, race, class, identity, sex and other topics is filtered through Smiley’s perspectives as a resident of California and paired with the work of these classic writers whose work informs her own." Lou Fancher, East Bay Express
"[The Questions That Matter Most] gathers essays (and two stories) composed with wit, enthusiasm, expertise, and candor [...] Smiley's agile, seemingly blithe inquiries are wryly incisive, ethically rigorous, and propelled by her profound passion for literature as an endless source of illumination and liberation." Donna Seaman, Booklist
“In this sharp compendium, Pulitzer Prize winner Smiley bring together her literary criticism, which brims with the same keen observations, inquisitiveness, and humor as her novels. […] Fleet-footed and smart, this delights.” Publishers Weekly
About the Author
