SOURCE: "The Lonesome Young Man on the Flying Trapeze," in The Virginia Quarterly Review, Vol. 20, No. 3, Summer, 1944, pp. 392-403.

In the following excerpt, Burgum perceives that Saroyan 's depiction of disillusioned, alienated Americans has evolved.

William Saroyan has reached the top of the ladder scarcely ten years after his first steps in learning to please the public. His achievement has not been the triumph of a vulgar opportunism. One can be sure (from reading "Sweeney in the Trees") that money has meant little to him; and if he has been tempted by fame, as his frequent references to his genius suggest, it is only that fame has seemed the proof of his being a likeable person. Writing has been the decoy by which he has sought to bring people closer to him. It has been the medium through which he could make more people the more intimately aware...