Anne Tyler, A Patchwork Planet

Cecilia Donohue (Independent Scholar - North America)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 3.2.4: American (US) Writing and Culture: Postwar and Contemporary, 1945-present.
Vol. editors: Emory Elliott (University of California, Riverside), Dale Enggass (University of Utah), Christopher Hugh Gair (University of Glasgow), Matthew Hofer (University of New Mexico), Stephen E. Meats (Pittsburg State University), Kerry Myler (Newman University), Justin Parks (UiT - The Arctic University of Norway), Nick Selby (University of East Anglia)

Dates

First circulation or publication 1998

Places

United States (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Novel

Resources

With her fourteenth novel, A Patchwork Planet (1998), Anne Tyler presented her readers with familiar themes and locations while addressing new issues. Based primarily in Baltimore, Maryland, the U.S. city serving as the setting for the majority of her works, A Patchwork Planet centers on a male character seeking meaning and connection in life (similar to Macon Leary in 1985’s The Accidental Tourist and Ian Bedloe of Saint Maybe, Tyler’s 1991’s novel). The plot of A Patchwork Planet includes unexpected, arguably irrational actions similar to those of characters from such earlier Tyler works as Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant (1982) and Ladder of Years (…

Please log in to consult the article in its entirety. If you are a member (student of staff) of a subscribing institution (see List), you should be able to access the LE on campus directly (without the need to log in), and off-campus either via the institutional log in we offer, or via your institution's remote access facilities, or by creating a personal user account with your institutional email address. If you are not a member of a subscribing institution, you will need to purchase a personal subscription. For more information on how to subscribe as an individual user, please see under Individual Subcriptions.

2027 words

Citation: Donohue, Cecilia. "A Patchwork Planet". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 25 January 2022 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=14841, accessed 23 November 2024.]

Save this article