ABSTRACT
The problems of isolating out a strand of one kind of fiction while American writers enjoyed being at the pinnacle of international acclaim are not only arbitrary—they are likely to seem fabricated. Any critic makes a series of judgment calls about which books—and which authors—deserve preservation in the annals of literary history. The Road takes on the fusion of theme and movement that has characterized so many great books, whether or not the authors of those books ever received the recognition such accomplishments should have garnered. Readers have come to expect the author's moral message, even as he created varied vehicles for its delivery. The same could be said for the equally weighty achievements of John Updike. Social science tended to take over after the 1960s political protests, whereas when readers critiqued a John Barth piece, regardless of its date, they emphasized craft.
