Jonathan Franzen’s new novel “Freedom” has already been scooped up by President Obama for his late-summer reading, lauded expansively by the New York Times, and projected to easily hit the best-seller list when it goes on sale tomorrow. Franzen himself has become the first author in a decade to grace the cover of Time magazine and, in advance of “Freedom”, has been called both the genius of a generation and the overexposed darling of the literary critics.
“Freedom”, the author’s first novel since the best-selling 2001 book “The Corrections”, follows the trials of a Midwestern family and scrutinizes life in the 21st century — and under the Bush administration — to the minute details. Michiko Kakutani of the Times called Franzen’s technique an “ability to throw open a big, Updikean picture window on American middle-class life”.
The arrival of “Freedom” and the praise surrounding it has also sparked a debate on the prevalence of male writers in the literary critical sphere. Author Jodi Picoult has been tweeting about the coverage “Freedom” has received from the Times, writing, “Would love to see the NYT rave about authors who aren’t white male literary darlings.” Fellow novelist Jennifer Weiner joined the conversation and coined the term “Franzenfreude”, calling out for “non-Franzen” writers who chronicle “The Way We Live Now” to gain recognition. In an interview with the Huffington Post, Weiner said that her criticism is nothing personal to Franzen, but an observation on the Times’ critical preference for “white guys” with MFAs and that literature written by women for women is usually overlooked.
Is Jonathan Franzen the next great American novelist or is the praise overrated? I have never read any of his work, so I can’t honestly offer an opinion of his writing. But I am intrigued by the sound of “Freedom.”
