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So it turns out that Sedgwick’s identifications with both gay men and Queen Esther were not very different from Woolf’s identifications with Strachey and Carrington. It also turns out that postmodern criticism—or queer theory, at any rate (thanks, once again, to Sedgwick herself)—is still more capable than modern literature of comprehending (both willing to deploy and able to fathom) sentimentality. More…

In Bright Shiny Morning, James Frey tries to convey the full horror of Los Angeles. He does so by writing four, possibly five books, four of them current-day romances, one—apparently for context—a history of the place. But it doesn’t quite add up to an entire whole, nor does it convey that horror. More…