Saul Bellow: There is Simply Too Much to Think About: Collected Non-Fiction, Edited by Benjamin Taylor

Abstract

Readers may be interested to know that I also reviewed the first collection of Bellow’s essays (It All Adds Up: From the Dim Past to the Uncertain Future, New York 1994) in these pages in 1995 and some of his novels were required readings in a course on the sociology of literature I used to teach. I also knew Bellow and met him several times. Last but not least, twenty years ago he provided a Bblurb,^ an endorsement for the paperback edition of one my books. It remains to be determined if these circumstances make me more, or less qualified to review his writings, including the present volume. The volume here discussed contains 57 items, and spans half a century; the first piece dating from 1948, the most recent from 2000. Bellow died in 2005 at the age of 86. The writings here collected appeared in a variety of publications: the Atlantic , Boston Globe , Commentary, Encounter, Nation, New York Times, New York Review of Books, New Yorker, Partisan Review, Salmagundi and others, as well in various edited volumes. Writings which also appeared in the first collection are listed by the editor in his acknowledgments. As is often the case is it is difficult to classify, or summarize the topics, and their major thrust of a large collection of writings especially since the editor chose to organize this volume chronologically, by decades rather than by the themes of the writings. By contrast, the earlier collection (noted above) that did not have an editor was organized topically (presumably by the author) consisting of substantive parts, such as BWriters, Intellectuals, Politics,^ BThoughts in Transition,^ BA Few Farewells,^ and others. Bellow occupied an unusual position in American society and literary life. While widely published, recognized and showered with tokens of recognition National Book Awards, Pulitzer Prize and Nobel Prize he was at times denounced as a diehard conservative, a sexist and politically incorrect elitist. His views did not endear him to the intellectuals who were still enthralled with what they considered the youthful revolutionary idealism of the 1960s and it residues in more recent times. One of the pieces in this volume BPapuans and Zulus^ is Bellow’s response to such attacks, in particular to the accusation that he failed to appreciate properly nonWestern cultures and was excessively enamored with Western classics. It is unfortunate as well as puzzling, that the editor chose to delete the concluding paragraphs of his original article (published in the New York Times, on March 10, 1994) in which Bellow made the following memorable points, among others: