The Tidewater Tales
656 pages.
Original publisher: Putnam.
Current publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press.
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Synopsis
Almost a companion-piece to Sabbatical. This gargantuan novel uses the same structure — first-person plural narration, a sail down the Chesapeake — but adds to it encounters with Don Quixote, Odysseus, and Scheherazade, as well as a pregnancy, episodes of stormy weather, and another story about sperm and eggs in the womb (see Lost in the Funhouse).
Although this novel certainly has its pleasures, the first-person plural narrative gets tedious when it goes on for over 650 pages. One also wonders why Barth has chosen to borrow so much of the plot and dialogue from the more terse and well-crafted Sabbatical.
Critical Reaction
“Those disheartened by the prophesied demise of literature may find solace in Barth’s launching of another water-message. It signals that an old-fashioned, if decidedly post-modern storyteller, remains afloat somewhere off Maryland’s Eastern Shore.”
— Philadelphia Inquirer
“Without question the richest, most ebullient and technically daring of any [novel] he has hitherto written… a hugely joyous celebration of life.”
— Washington Post Book World
Resources
- Review by The New York Times
- Johns Hopkins University Press page for Tidewater Tales
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