For whatever reason, I really like Richard Ford’s trilogy about Frank Bascombe. Maybe I’m obsessed with age and time and place, as I also really enjoyed Updike’s Rabbit adventures.
In this article from BookForum, Ford talks about how Bascombe never was meant to be an “everyman” which I call BS on. Bascombe is the quintessential everyman–his suburban life with a culmination into real estate along with estranged family circumstances. Of course some of his events are eccentric for purely humorous reasons–but at the same time they portray an endearing American-ness to them. Which is to say if a book, a character strikes a chord with the vox populi like Bascombe, it’s okay if he’s an everyman. An everyman to express what we’re all feeling.
The best: “If it seems that fear played a large part in conceiving these three books, it might just be that fear plays a large part in any work that aspires to the lofty condition of literature. Fear of the unknown. Fear of failure, again. Fear of not, at least, trying to meet the challenge of one’s youthful aspirations.”-Richard Ford about his trilogy on Frank Bascombe.
