This is a concise literary history of Chicago, from its emergence as America's privileged site of capitalist modernity, emblematized by the conjunction in 1893 of the Great Columbian Exposition, the presentation of Frederick Jackson Turner's frontier thesis, and the publication of Henry Blake Fuller's The Cliff Dwellers, to the appearance of Saul Bellow's The Adventures of Augie March (1953), which Køhlert frames as resolving the specificities of the mid-western metropolis into grander paradigms of nation and world. Devoting short (six- or seven-page) summaries to major writers, the contours of this trajectory are familiar enough, though welcome coverage is provided of Floyd Dell, and of newspaper work by Eugene Field and George Ade, and its role in giving voice to an urban middle class. Largely a work of synthesis, the book's originality lies in its firm touch in marshalling readings of twenty key literary figures into a coherent narrative.

To attempt this in a mere 180 pages requires a brash self-confidence analogous to that associated with Chicago since the Great Fire of 1871, a self-confidence which often figures in subsequent literary depictions as the dominant quality of the city, whether deplored by Fuller, Robert Herrick, and Jack London, or adored by Theodore Dreiser. Its effects here are also somewhat mixed. Both the overall structure of the book and the capsule summaries of individual writers are admirably clear and engaging. Space precludes much in the way of new interpretations, but the juxtapositions of Fuller and Frank Norris; Hamlin Garland and William Dean Howells; and Richard Wright, Nelson Algren, and Gwendolyn Brooks point up significant similarities and differences, as well as succinctly examining the theme of Chicago in the work of writers whose engagement varied in duration and intensity.

Køhlert succeeds also in providing a generational template for understanding Chicago as a literary theme that would provide an engaging introduction to the topic. At times the declarative mode that is so useful in maintaining a clear thematic focus results in oversimplification, the premature resolution of critical debates, and some omissions and distortions. Discussion of James T. Farrell ignores his short fiction set in Chicago, in part because Studs Lonigan (1934) is used to exemplify the larger forms that are argued to be eschewed by later writers. Oddly and unnecessarily, Køhlert disparages Dreiser's output after Sister Carrie (1900), while his enthusiasm for Bellow is unbounded. Nevertheless, it is refreshing that, throughout, the book brings alive the ethical and hermeneutical impulses that have animated many Chicago writers.