SOURCE: Jacobs, Rita D. Review of Straight Man, by Richard Russo. World Literature Today 72, no. 4 (autumn 1998): 832-33.

In the following review, Jacobs commends the “complex” and “witty” protagonist of Straight Man.

There is no denying the voyeuristic allure of a novel set in your own backyard, or in one that very much resembles it, and peopled by your neighbors. This is certainly part of the charm of Straight Man. It is a novel of academe, and better yet, the central character is an English professor surrounded by the wondrous diversity of beleaguered souls who have also chosen that profession. But Richard Russo's work is more than merely “an academic novel,” meaning it is not limited by a fusty formula. Neither is it a genre novel which focuses on an exploration of undergraduate peccadilloes, a kind of borderline bordello novel. Rather, Russo's fourth novel (after Mohawk, The Risk Pool...