Works
Lafferty's quirky prose drew from traditional storytelling, both Irish and Native American, and his shaggy characters and tall tales are unique in science fiction. Little of Lafferty's writing is considered typical of the genre. His stories are more tall tale than traditional science fiction and are deeply influenced by his Catholic beliefs; Fourth Mansions, for example, draws on The Interior Mansions of Teresa of Avila.
In any event, his writings, both topically and stylistically, are not easy to categorize. Plot is frequently secondary to anything else Lafferty does in his stories, which has caused him to have a loyal cult following, but has caused some readers to give up attempting to read his work.
Not all of Lafferty's work was science fiction or fantasy; his novel Okla Hannali, published by University of Oklahoma Press, tells the story of the Choctaw in Mississippi, and after the Trail of Tears, in Oklahoma, through an account of the larger-than-life character Hannali and his large family. This novel was thought of highly by the novelist Dee Brown, who published an influential book (Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee) in 1970 on the violent relationship between Native Americans and American expansionism.
Lafferty's work is represented by Virginia Kidd Literary Agency, which holds a cache of his still-unpublished manuscripts.
Read more about this topic: R. A. Lafferty
Famous quotes containing the word works:
“Most works of art are effectively treated as commodities and most artists, even when they justly claim quite other intentions, are effectively treated as a category of independent craftsmen or skilled workers producing a certain kind of marginal commodity.”
—Raymond Williams (1921–1988)
“Night and Day ‘ve been tampered with,
Every quality and pith
Surcharged and sultry with a power
That works its will on age and hour.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Most young black females learn to be suspicious and critical of feminist thinking long before they have any clear understanding of its theory and politics.... Without rigorously engaging feminist thought, they insist that racial separatism works best. This attitude is dangerous. It not only erases the reality of common female experience as a basis for academic study; it also constructs a framework in which differences cannot be examined comparatively.”
—bell hooks (b. c. 1955)