Talk:Paul Auster

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Themes

This section on Themes is weighed down by the remnant of an old version of this page which goes back at least 14 years. Here’s how it read:

According to a dissertation by Heiko Jakubzik at the University of Heidelberg, two central influences in Paul Auster's writing are Jacques Lacan's psychoanalysis and the American transcendentalism of the early to middle 19th century, namely amongst others Henry David Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson.^[1]

Here’s how it reads on 07 May 2024:

Much of the early scholarship^{[citation needed]} about Auster's work saw links between it and the theories of such French writers as Jacques Lacan, Jacques Derrida, and others.

and

Other scholars[citation needed] have seen influences in Auster's work of the American transcendentalists of the nineteenth century, as exemplified by Henry David Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson. The transcendentalists believed that the symbolic order of civilization has separated us from the natural order of the world, and that by moving into nature, as Thoreau did, as he described in Walden, it would be possible to return to this natural order.[citation needed]

Now there are citation needed tags {cn} that are directly related to this assertion of “two influences on Auster’s writing.” It’s just not anything that can be corroborated by any web searches and using the ebscohost. Also, these citation needed tags are holding up this Auster WP article from being featured as a RD on the ITN page. Therefore I’m removing these remnants of a thesis only asserted by Heiko Jakubzik, although I did find a scholarly article on Auster and the transcendentalist but it’s in Spanish.Christian Roess (talk) 04:59, 7 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

References

^ An old revision of this page as edited on 12 October 2010

Reception

It seems to me that the 'Reception' section is overly long and largely centers the views of one critic (James Wood) by quoting his criticisms of Auster. While criticism is entirely valid, I'm not sure how much it adds to the article having such a large chunk of it made up of a copy/paste from one critic's views on Auster. Would recommend significantly cutting this, does anyone have any thoughts or objections to this?Boredintheevening (talk) 02:53, 10 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I would agree. At the very least, the parody should be completely scrapped. I don't think it is fitting for an encyclopedia and that Wood's description of Auster's prose preceeding the parody quotation is enough to make the point.--Zamomin (talk) 09:10, 16 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Untitled

This line stood out, as it seems opinionated ... Regarding Auster, "His later work has matured to be less pretentious in style while retaining its appeal to lovers of post-modern literature." Was "Travels in the scriptorium" really "critically acclaimed"? I think it was the exact opposite. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 163.247.80.7 (talk) 23:49, 16 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Style?

There is no information on Auster's stylistic devices - occasionally some vague points are made in the individual articles on each of his published works, but there is nothing addressing the author's very well-defined style. For example, a few of the book-articles mention the almost autobiographical nature of Auster's characters, which is a strong theme throughout his work.

There is no article on Leviathan, one of his most acclaimed works... I was going to write a lengthy article on Leviathan myself, but now I'm considering doing a much shorter one, but adding more to this page in terms of style/themes etc. I could then link the various (short) book-articles back to the main thing, saving repetition, and further highlighting his rigidly structured style.

Also there are a few over-opinionated lines in the articles (as has already been noted) - I might change some of these around a bit.

Any objections? If no one has replied within the next day or so, I'll start work!

bish 21:04, 5 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I tried to put something into the article about his reoccurring subjects. --Kaffeeringe.de 21:31, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I am amused by the synchronicity. I have gone by the name of Sidney Orr for 60+ years, since my father, as many of his clan, shortened it from "Orlovitz" -- previously a Lithuanian Kovno/Kaunus-based clan. The character in Mr Auster's book affected my appearance in Google searches substantially. The world may be better for that. Sidney Orr (talk) 08:04, 16 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

"Themes"?

When referring to one of "Paul Auster's reappearing subjects," what does "American space" mean? I can think of at least three different connotations of this phrase, so can the contributor--or someone else --be more exact, or just delete this, the last of 14 (!) such items of reappearing subjects?Mwprods (talk) 21:47, 3 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

French award - what and when?

There is some contradiction as to what grade of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres he received and when. According to clapfilmes, in '92 he was made Commander, whereas biography.jrank says it was Chevalier. Enotes agrees with Chevalier, but says it was in '93. Once this is resolved, the info can be added to the article. Jay (talk) 13:44, 19 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I have checked within the French Wikipedia where it appears that Auster was made Chevalier of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres as far as 1992 and Commandeur of the same order in 2007. --189.135.115.104 (talk) 21:32, 9 February 2011 (UTC) (Portokali, from France)[reply]

Auggie Wren

Just wondering if anyone would have details to add of this book [1] Cos Eile 15:10, 25 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Copyright problem

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/* External links */

I've tried to tidy up the links section.

The following links seemed worthy of deletion to me, but feel free to challenge:

The "review of the collected of poems" (http://moviesbooksandmusic.today.com/2009/06/18/paul-auster-collected-poems/) is a broken link.
The "Literaturhaus Stuttgart, October 2, 2008" (http://www.literaturhaus-stuttgart.de/paul-auster.html) is a broken link.
Garan Holcombe's 'Reflections On the Work of Paul Auster' (http://www.calitreview.com/Essays/paul_auster_5007.htm) is a broken link.
The link to his UK publisher (http://www.faber.co.uk/) didn't seem informative to me, as it only links to their homepage, not to a specific Paul Auster page.

I tried to introduce an order - mainly grouping the links to interviews together and ordering them chronologically.

I'd also question the links to the Spanish and Portuguese blogs; as this is the English-language entry, perhaps they should only be on the Spanish-language and Portuguese-language entries respectively?

FrenchieAlexandre (talk) 01:30, 7 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Questions of influence

I know that Auster is well versed in the French canon, and that he's renowned as a translator. But grasping the extent and precise sort of this influence and whether or not he would call himself a postmodernist- putting aside if other people have- is difficult given the contents of this article. We seem to have different links attesting to (totally) different degrees of influence and personal association. A new version is called for. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.162.18.136 (talk) 00:48, 11 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

[1] An old revision of this page as edited on 12 October 2010

[1]