American literature is a story of expanding frontiers. Our expert interviews will lead you through the full range of literature, from the early days of the American republic to the defining moments of 9/11. The diversity of America is revealed in its literature.
The American Revolutionary Period (1775–83)
Thomas Paine
Thomas Jefferson
The Romantic period (1830 to 1870)
Edgar Allan Poe
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Frederick Douglass
Henry David Thoreau
Herman Melville
Emily Dickinson
Harriet Beecher Stowe
Realism and Naturalism (1870 to 1910)
Mark Twain
Theodore Dreiser
Louisa May Alcott
Henry James
The Modernist Period (1910 to 1945)
F. Scott Fitzgerald
Zora Neale Hurston
Ernest Hemingway
William Faulkner
John Steinbeck
Claude McKay
Contemporary Period (1945 to present)
Ralph Ellison
James Baldwin
Ursula Le Guin
Toni Morrison
David Foster Wallace
N. Scott Momaday
Ha Jin
Junot Díaz
Sylvia Plath
The Best 20th-Century American Novels, recommended by David Hering
The story of America is not one of a manageable unified nation, says novelist and critic David Hering. It may, however, be the story of America’s dream — which is why many of the best American novels have a distinctly dreamlike quality. He picks out five of the best American novels of the 20th century, from 1905 through to 1987.
The Best 19th-Century American Novels, recommended by Nathan Wolff
In the novels of the 19th century, the United States comes alive with all its contradictions and complications. Nathan Wolff, a professor of English at Tufts and author of Not Quite Hope and Other Political Emotions in the Gilded Age, introduces us to his picks of the best 19th-century American novels, including two works of historical fiction and a memoir that influenced the novel form.
The Great American Novel, recommended by Lawrence Buell
Albeit an object of satire and overreach, the ‘Great American Novel’ remains a vital concept in American literature, encouraging writers to capture the essence of national culture and history, argues Lawrence Buell, Professor of American Literature Emeritus at Harvard University. He talks us through the origins of the phrase and nominates five novels as contenders.
The Best South Asian American Novels, recommended by Wajahat Ali
South Asian Americans are too often treated as sidekicks or even suspects in national narratives. Wajahat Ali recommends five fantastic novels by South Asian American authors, and makes a compelling case that for the United States to succeed as a multi-racial democracy, “it is key that people pick up the pen to tell America’s full story.”
The Best Toni Morrison Books, recommended by Marilyn Mobley
In 1993, the Nobel Prize in Literature was awarded to American novelist Toni Morrison, “who in novels characterized by visionary force and poetic import, gives life to an essential aspect of American reality.” Here, literary scholar Marilyn Mobley—Professor Emerita of English and African American Studies at Case Western Reserve University and a former President of the Toni Morrison Society—introduces her work, from the best novel to start with to the essays she published just before her death in 2019.
The Best Philip Roth Books, recommended by Ira Nadel
Philip Roth was one of the great contemporary American novelists. He wrote about what he saw when he looked in the mirror, even when he didn’t like it, and claimed his only real interest was writing about what made him feel uncomfortable. Roth’s literary biographer, Ira Nadel, Professor Emeritus at the University of British Columbia, talks us through Philip Roth’s novels and explains why they’re worth reading.
The best books on The Harlem Renaissance, recommended by William J. Maxwell
It was a golden age for American culture, a flourishing of Black literature, music and the arts that exploded in the 1910s and lasted through to the Great Depression. It was focused on Harlem, the area of New York City above Central Park, but its origins and its impact were much, much broader. William J. Maxwell, Professor of English and African American Studies at Washington University in St. Louis, recommends some of the best books on the Harlem Renaissance.
The Best Herman Melville Books, recommended by Hester Blum
Today it is celebrated as one of America’s great novels, but when it came out, Moby-Dick was received with little acclaim and none of the commercial success of Herman Melville’s first book, Typee. Here, Hester Blum, Professor of English at Penn State, introduces the 19th century American novelist and recommends which books to read by and about him.
The Best William Faulkner Books, recommended by Ahmed Honeini
Where to start with the novels of the American writer William Faulkner, chronicler of the Old South and winner of the 1949 Nobel Prize in Literature? Here, Faulkner scholar Ahmed Honeini of Royal Holloway, University of London, recommends the best books by and about the man who tried to capture “the agony and sweat of the human spirit”.
Fran Lebowitz on New York Writers
‘The authors of these five books are people who came to New York for freedom – not so they could get rich, but so they could be free to pursue their interests and live their lives the way they wanted.’ New Yorker par excellence Fran Lebowitz recommends the writers who best capture her immutably mutable city.