In Farther Away, which gathers together essays and speeches written mostly in the past five years, Jonathan Franzen returns with renewed vigour to the themes, both human and literary, that have long preoccupied him. Whether recounting his violent encounter with bird poachers in Cypress or examining his mixed feelings about the suicide of friend and rival David Foster Wallace, these pieces deliver on Franzen’s implicit promise to conceal nothing from the reader. Taken together, these essays trace the progress of a unique and mature mind wrestling with itself, with literature, and with some of the most important issues of our day.
