![]() ![]() Whitehead explains that he wears such literary drag in order to deny "narrative satisfaction" and refuse the repetition and predictability that comes with generic forms. I was wearing realist drag in the same way that I have worn detective drag or horror drag in my other books" ("Colson"). Whitehead admitted his playful approach to literary genres in a 2013 interview with Nikesh Shukla that touched on his fifth book, Sag Harbor (2009): "That novel is my take on a traditionally realist genre, the coming of age novel. ![]() For Whitehead, generic conventions are established only to be subverted or discarded. ![]() Zone One (2011) is an incisive cultural critique slumming as a zombie-apocalypse novel. The Intuitionist (1999) is a detective story with film-noir valences wrapped around a passing narrative. Critics most often describe his books as hybrid forms, as if by naming all their literary frames the essence of these by turn brilliant and frustrating books might be captured. Every novel by Colson Whitehead is an affront to genre. ![]()
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