Kyle Harrison
to-read
The Dream of the Great American Novel
- Author
- Lawrence Buell
- Published
- 2014
- Pages
- 584
- Recommended
- Once
Why it’s on the list: Why the idea of a single Great American Novel persists, and which books keep getting nominated — Buell’s case runs from The Scarlet Letter to Beloved.
Where I saw it: Aaron Gwyn (@AmericanGwyn) on X, February 11, 2026, listing the books Buell makes the case for — “The Scarlett Letter, Moby-Dick, Huck Finn, The Invisible Man, Beloved, and Absalom, Absalom.”
Connections
- Blood Meridian — the book Kyle himself described as the Great American Novel on reading it; this is the scholarly version of that argument.
- Republic of Letters
- Language of Discourse — a canon is a vocabulary.
Referenced in
- Blood Meridian book