Upward Mobility and the Common Good

Bruce Robbins's powerful case ... is that every successfully self-bettering individual relies upon others, and that the limit example of such dependence is embodied in the welfare state. Modern Language Quarterly Robbins's book makes a timely appearance, given the current interest in immigration and class mobility, especially in the U.S. Robbins carefully distinguishes his study of upward mobility stories, both fiction and nonfiction, from other work on the subject...Robbins's style is readable and energetic; his brisk, lucid analyses flow. His notes are informative, offering full publishing information about texts he used in researching and writing this interesting book. -- J.A. Dompkowski Choice [I]n its method and its claims, this highly original, elegantly written book deserves a wide audience; in its effort to recast our understanding of the (class) politics of American literary history, it merits the deepest interest of readers of these pages. -- Lori Merish American Literary History For some time upward mobility stories have been a pervasive element of U.S. political culture. This is the best book around for understanding the complexities of how they work. -- Evan Watkins Novel Upward Mobility and the Common Good is an original and important treatment of a crucially important topic. -- Dan Bivona Romanticism and Victorianism on the Net Robbins' Upward Mobility shows us what literary criticism, at its very best, can do... [He] throws into relief what had been an overlooked line of argument in other critics' works. -- Amanda Claybaugh The Minnesota Review [A] groundbreaking work of political literary criticism... His discussion of sociology as a combat sport, focused on the upward-mobility narratives of several distinguished sociologists, and on lowly origins as cultural capital, makes trenchant reading... [O]ne of the more important books of the decade. -- Judie Newman Journal of American Studies