Of Time and the River ─ A Legend of Man's Hunger in His Youth

The sequel to Thomas Wolfe's remarkable first novel, Look Homeward, Angel, Of Time and the River is one of the great classics of American literature. The book chronicles the maturing of Wolfe's autobiographical character, Eugene Gant, in his desperate search for fulfillment, making his way from small-town North Carolina to the wider world of Harvard University, New York City, and Europe. In a massive, ambitious, and boldly passionate novel, Wolfe examines the passing of time and the nature of the creative process, as Gant slowly but ecstatically embraces the urban life, recognizing it as a necessary ordeal for the birth of his creative genius as a writer.

The work of an exceptionally expressive writer of fertile imagination and startling emotional intensity, Of Time and the River illuminates universal truths about art and life, city and country, past and present. It is a novel that is majestic and enduring. As P. M. Jack observed in The New York Times, "It is a triumphant demonstration that Thomas Wolfe has the stamina to produce a magnificent epic of American life."

This edition, published in celebration of Wolfe's centennial anniversary, contains a new introduction by Pat Conroy.

Born in Asheville, North Carolina, in 1900, Thomas Wolfe was educated at the University of North Carolina and at Harvard. He became an instructor in English at New York University in 1924, serving intermittently until 1930. He traveled extensively thereafter in Europe and in America. He was one of the great prose stylists in American literature, whose legacy has had tremendous influence on numerous Southern writers, including William Styron, James Dickey, and Walker Percy. Wolfe died in Baltimore in 1938.