SOURCE: Dutton, Robert R. “The Adventures of Augie March.” In Saul Bellow, pp. 42-74. Boston, Mass.: Twayne Publishers, 1982.

In the following essay, Dutton surveys a range of critical interpretations of The Adventures of Augie March, arguing that Augie's failures throughout the novel act “as a depiction both of a human condition and of contemporary literature and the artist.”

The Adventures of Augie March (1953) must be read as a multilevel work if the reader is to comprehend fully its significance. First, the novel is to be seen as a story in which a picaresquelike hero, who is also the narrator, advances through a series of adventures which, in varying degree and nature, are relevant to a general life experience. Second, the work is to be regarded as Bellow's strictures on an existing relationship between literature and society. More specifically, on this second level, Augie March is a fictional history...