James A. Michener

Paper Summary:

This paper explains that, as a writer, Michener is difficult to classify because, in his drive to express his point of view and to point up the difficulties and contradictions inherent in our world, he employs widely differing techniques and fuses together several genres. The author points out that Michener's literary histories bring the realities of history to a level of personal reality that each of us is capable of understanding. The paper relates that Michener is fully cognizant of the part played by human psychology in the shaping of world events; the great men and women who mold our world are themselves human beings, with their own psychological problems and foibles just like the rest of us. Michener uses these psychological traits to predict actions and situations.

From the Paper:

"Michener's "pre-occupation" with minor details is a deliberate choice. Nothing he describes is not part of the mix. The sort of psychological determinism that pervades his works fits nicely with all of the other facets of his technique. Realism and New Historicism demand life-like detail. Our world - Michener's world - is a real place. It operates according to fixed natural laws. These laws can be put the test much as a scientist repeats the experiments of his colleagues in order to see whether their conclusions are true. In the case of human beings, fictional or otherwise, it is only difficult to predict the future because the range of experiences available to each individual is so incomprehensibly vast. By providing the smallest and seemingly most innocuous bits, Michener wishes us to see his creations as living beings, and these living beings are themselves placed in an environment that is as solid and substantial as the homes in which we ourselves live; our offices, schools; city streets and fields. The more we absorb of Michener's narrative picture, the more we become a part of that picture."

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