{"product_id":"lost-in-the-funhouse-isbn-9780385240871","title":"Lost in the Funhouse","description":"\u003cb\u003eNATIONAL BOOK AWARD FINALIST • John Barth's lively, highly original collection of short pieces is a major landmark of experimental fiction exploring themes of purpose and the meaning of existence. \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\"[Barth] ran riot over literary rules and conventions, even as he displayed, with meticulous discipline, mastery of and respect for them.\" —\u003ci\u003eThe New York Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrom its opening story, \"Frame-Tale\"--printed sideways and designed to be cut out by the reader and twisted into a never-ending Mobius strip--to the much-anthologized \"Life-Story,\" whose details are left to the reader to \"fill in the blank,\" Barth's acclaimed collection challenges our ideas of what fiction can do. Highlights include the Homerian story-wthin-a-story-within-a-story (times seven) of \"Menalaiad,' and \"Night-Sea Journey,\" a first-person account of a confused human sperm on its way to fertilize an egg. All of the characters in \u003ci\u003eLost in the Funhouse \u003c\/i\u003eare searching, in one way or another, for their purpose and the meaning of their existence. Together, their stories form a kaleidescope of exuberant metafictional inventiveness.“[Barth’s] style [is] one of the most plastic and delightful in American writing. . . . Almost helplessly he writes a story even when he is squirming like Houdini to transmute form into as strange a permutation as he can. His real interest is in the reader and in the metaphysical plight of imagination engaging with imagination.” —\u003ci\u003eThe New York Times\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\"Barth] crafted labyrinthine, fantastical tales that were at once bawdy and philosophical, placing him on the cutting edge of the postmodern literary movement.\" \u003ci\u003e—\u003ci\u003eThe Washington Post\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e“[A] playfully erudite author whose darkly comic and complicated novels revolved around the art of literature and launched countless debates over the art of fiction.”\u003ci\u003e —\u003ci\u003eThe Guardian\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003eJohn Barth\u003c\/b\u003e (1930-2024) was an American writer celebrated for his postmodern and metafictional fiction. Barth’s first novel, \u003ci\u003eThe Floating Opera\u003c\/i\u003e, was published in 1956, followed by \u003ci\u003eThe End of the Road. \u003c\/i\u003eBarth achieved critical and commercial success in the 1960s with \u003ci\u003eThe Sot-Weed Factor \u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eGiles Goat-Boy\u003c\/i\u003e. His collection of interconnected stories, \u003ci\u003eLost in the Funhouse\u003c\/i\u003e, was a finalist for the National Book Award in 1969. His other works include \u003ci\u003eChimera\u003c\/i\u003e, a collection of three novellas that won the National Book Award in 1973; \u003ci\u003eLetters\u003c\/i\u003e, an epistolary novel; \u003ci\u003eSabbatical: A Romance\u003c\/i\u003e; and \u003ci\u003eThe Friday Book\u003c\/i\u003e, a collection of essays.","brand":"Anchor","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46303545032933,"sku":"NP9780385240871","price":16.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780385240871.jpg?v=1767731826","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/lost-in-the-funhouse-isbn-9780385240871","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}