In volume 43, issue 1 of this journal, I expressed my disappointment that two converted PhDs by Brendan Martin and Mark Brown recapitulated exhausted areas of analysis when so much of Auster's oeuvre and his extensive list of influences remained unexplored. What follows is a slightly more positive review of three new converted PhD theses which seem at least to contribute something new.

Understanding Paul Auster by James Peacock contains the least original material of the three as it works within the remit of a series aimed at “introducing” the work of canonical American authors “as planned guides or companions for students as well as good non-academic readers” (Series Editor's Preface). Because of this, extensive sections are dedicated to summary of Auster's novels, in particular The New York Trilogy, and to informing readers about publication details and what critics have made of his work. Peacock does, however, make some insightful arguments concerning the ways in which Auster's work often has an “underlying Jewish sensibility” (95). Also, it is acknowledged that other academics have allowed a preoccupation with The New York Trilogy to set up “the critical parameters” (133) within which other works are discussed.

Another idea that is addressed is that “trauma” relating to American and Jewish history is a key factor in understanding the aesthetics of Auster's fiction, in particular his post-9/11 oeuvre. I would have liked to see more of this, as Peacock barely skims the surface of the seven novels published by Auster after 9/11 and does not acknowledge the fact that Auster has been so verbose about American politics since 9/11 as to be seen by some as a “polemical” or “activist” novelist. Despite this, Peacock's book is encouraging as its intended readership will not be encouraged simply to relate Auster's work to what Lyotard, Baudrillard, et al. have had to say about contemporary culture and linguistics. Peacock's analysis may be a little thin, but the book is informative and is at least open to the possibilities of approaching the author from a variety of angles.

If Peacock's book is a small step in the right direction then Theobald's is, in my view, a giant leap when placed against the prevalent failings within Auster criticism to date. Students who read Existentialism and Baseball will benefit in at least two ways. The first is that they will encounter a wholly original analysis of Auster's work. In the process, the reader will become better informed about themes and motifs within surrealism and existentialism. The main drive of Theobald's thesis is to link recurring motifs in Auster's fiction to the work of Sartre, Camus, Blanchot and Merleau-Ponty. This provides an illuminating framework in which to discuss such recurrent Auster themes as chance, (in-)authetic freedom and bad faith. Theobald's argument is convincing as Auster translated Sartre and was clearly influenced by Blanchot. At times he is able to neatly tie in Auster's treatment of his protagonists with theories expounded by the European writers named above.

There are a couple of flaws to this book, however; the first relating to what Theobald overlooks when he states that many of the protagonists' behaviours are an artistic mode of expression, for instance, in terms of the author working out existential conundrums. Theobald discusses the desires of Auster's protagonists to hide, disguise and repeat self-destructive patterns without any significant comment on the fact that the vast majority of these characters begin their narrative trajectory by absorbing an overwhelming and life-changing trauma. As such, many of the novels could be discussed as relevant to ongoing Jewish themes in fiction. Theobald mentions Auster's traumatic background, Jewish experience, and links in his writing to the Holocaust, but having done so simply moves on and does not incorporate these influencing factors into the main body of his argument. If Auster is, as Theobald implies, engaging with the works of the European writers named above then surely his Jewish experience provides one possible avenue of explanation as to what inspires his interest.

Another slight criticism that I would make is signposted in the book's title. Theobald largely discusses Auster's work in terms of European influence, although he does allow that in some cases American movements such as transcendentalism interact and overlap with European thinking. I think that Theobald is a little rash in dismissing the American influences on Auster's work, as he does when he argues that the author treats topics such as baseball “through foreign eyes,” whereas when Don DeLillo and Philip Roth cover similar ground “it occasionally appears like an inside joke to a non-American reader” (21). It has long been acknowledged that Auster is a Francophile and that his work is more popular in Europe than it is in America (which partly inspired Theobald's study); however, his continual engagement with American authors, genres, politics and history deserves more attention than it receives here. Having said this I still found this book a refreshing change as it is a genuine attempt to construct a new argument concerning the philosophical foundations of Auster's work.

Almost predictably, the book which, of the three, impressed me most was the self-published thesis, Andreas Hau's The Implosion of Negativity. The reasons for this relate primarily to its originality. This is the first book-length discussion of Auster's career as a poet before his rise to critical acclaim as a novelist in the early 1980s. As Hau is aware of this and ends his analysis with the The New York Trilogy (where the majority of studies begin), his work constitutes a revisionist critique of Auster's background as a writer and the development of concerns that permeate his work. Hau's commentary on Auster's “pre-life” as a poet, the publication details and the sources will provide Auster scholars with valuable and accessible background information unavailable elsewhere. Furthermore, this volume contains a transcript of Hau's 2001 interview with Auster which in itself contains valuable new material.

The analysis of the poetry itself is dominated by Hau's insistence that Jewish or “Old Testament” themes are central. There are long passages in which Hau's analysis is discursive (often the case when the subject is lyric poetry), but his detailed linking to the influence of European Jewish poets including Celan and Jabès adds credibility to his arguments. The overall conclusion is that Auster wrote poetry in the same frame of mind as did the Jewish American poet Laura Riding, this being with the sense that he would eventually “fall silent” (24). In short, despite Auster's natural empathy with “negative” European (and specifically Jewish) philosophical and poetic roots, Auster's fiction is infused with the insight that the generic confines of lyric poetry were too restrictive for the positive and outgoing concerns that resound in his prose work.

Where Hau's argument intersects with Theobald's is in the discussion of Auster's development which moved him towards the influence of American poets including Emerson, Thoreau and Wallace Stevens. Clearly Hau sees Auster's eventually settling into a career as a novelist as a move away from European influences and concerns which preoccupied him as a young and more “negative” writer. I warmed to Hau's argument as his work on Auster's early career is original and extremely well researched. Theobald would have benefited from having read it before constructing his own argument. Hau's final analysis that The New York Trilogy is an attempt on Auster's part to straddle the positives of both ends of his career as poet and novelist seems trenchant in light of what precedes it.