[Mr. Fiedler is a] dedicated and insistent "nay-sayer," [and] the very title of his present collection of essays [No! In Thunder] … tells us that he is embarking on a voyage of destruction; that he is intent on demolishing the "household gods" of both popular ignorance and the academic credo of the "new critics."

The material in the present volume covers an almost fantastic range of interests: from Hamlet to Jack Kerouac; from Oedipus Rex to the Leopold-Loeb trial; from Huckleberry Finn to the present role of the Negro in American society. If the range in subject matter is unbelievable so is the range of the book's style: the most incomprehensible academic jargon of the mythic school of critics cheek by jowl with pungent, direct statements of the author's personal likes and dislikes. For an example of Mr. Fiedler at his worst, try the following sentence: "There is something...