Praising James Agee

Over at Open Letters, Liza Birnbaum offers an appreciation of James Agee and in particular of Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, which, despite its anti-art bias, is perhaps the most artistically ambitious chronicle ever written by an American writer.Unfortunately, Liza's piece does not address the topic of how influential Agee was as a stylist. How clearly and completely many passages in the Agee book anticipated by about 20 years Jack Kerouac's more celebrated style is, by itself, worthy of at least a lengthy essay. The old influence-anxiety may have led Kerouac to conceal or "forget" Agee's impact.

James Agee and the Modern Chronicle

James Agee's "Let Us Now Praise Famous Men" is to the modern chronicle what James Joyce's "Ulysses" is to the modern novel.