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The Missouri Review

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Ben Siegel

Ben Siegel, Professor of English at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, was formerly head of the department and Director of the Annual Conferences in Modern American Writing at Cal Poly’s Center for Continuing Education. His books include The Puritan Heritage, Isaac Bashevis Singer, and The Controversial Sholem Asch. [1983]

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6.2 Cover

Nonfiction

Jan 01 1983

Saul Bellow and the University as Villain

Few American novelists talk about the university as much as Saul Bellow. Certainly no other subject stirs in him equal rancor and resentment. He reiterates his unhappiness with the university in lecture and interview, essay and fiction. He has done so since early in his career. His views are not totally consistent, but they are clear and uncompromising. Bellow does not underestimate the university’s importance. He knows this country’s literary activity is not concentrated in New York or Chicago or any city, and its literary intellectuals are not molded on Grub Street or in Bohemia.