Gilbert Sorrentino

Gilbert Sorrentino (April 27, 1929 – May 18, 2006) was an American novelist, short story writer, poet, literary critic, and editor. In over twenty-five works of fiction and poetry, Sorrentino explored the comic and formal possibilities of language and literature. His insistence on the primacy of language and his forays into metafiction mark him as a postmodernist, but he is also known for his ear for American speech and his attention to the particularities of place, especially of his native Brooklyn. Sorrentino was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1929. In 1956, Sorrentino founded the literary magazine Neon with friends from Brooklyn College, including childhood friend Hubert Selby Jr. He edited Neon from 1956 to 1960, then served as...