Couturier: Nabokov in postmodernist land

[jbor at bigpond.com]

'Nabokov in postmodernist land' by Maurice Couturier
_Critique_ 34.4, Summer 1993, pp. 247-260

Interesting essay (pdf) which addresses Brian McHale's analysis of _Lot 
49_'s postmodernism, and offers a useful (if incomplete) chronology of 
American postmodernist fiction from 1950:

Excerpt
"In April 1988, Robert Coover gathered a group of fellow postmodernists 
(Barthelme, Elkin, Gass, Gaddis, Hawkes, among others) and of friendly 
critics at Brown University for a conference entitled "Unspeakable 
Practices--A Three-Day Celebration of Iconoclastic American Fiction." 
During one of the discussions, a French critic, Laurent Souchu, 
humorously offered the following criteria for spotting a postmodernist 
writer: (1) A postmodernist never wears a tie; (2) he drinks Mexican 
beer and French wine; (3) he is a fervent heterosexual; (4) he loves to 
read in his bath and is sorry that publishers do not provide unsinkable 
paper; (5) he teaches creative writing but hates himself for it; (6) he 
was once lionized by Ihab Hassan; (7) his grandchildren will be proud 
of him; (8) he is an anarchist but votes Democratic; (9) he is totally 
free of guilt; and (10) he admires Nabokov, who thank goodness is dead. 
Of all the writers present, only John Hawkes (for whom the conference 
was a kind off a retirement party) objected to the last statement, 
claiming that he sadly lamented the death of Nabokov whom he had always 
admired, especially for his subtle handling of sex and eroticism. 
[...]"

best