Richard Bausch’s “Playhouse”
As you might guess, a novel about a theater called “The Globe” will likely include Shakespearean-like knaves, fools, villains, and flawed heroes. Playhouse includes them, but there’s no play within a play here. Divided into six parts, the traditional third-person story is told from the points of view of Thaddeus, Malcolm, and Claudette. There are few, if any, post-postmodern experimental shenanigans here. Instead, Bausch, that Old Lion of Literature, who’s won many awards for his long and short fiction, is a consummate realist as a storyteller, and, as I’ve said in the past: No one is better at realistic storytelling than Bausch.
You can read my review of Richard Bausch’s Playhouse in The Brooklyn Rail by clicking the image below.
You can buy Richard Bausch’s Playhouse at Barnes & Noble.