Oppositions

A collection of provocative and searchingly analytical essays by the author of Bad Behavior, This is Pleasure, and Lost Cat.

'Mary Gaitskill is willing to think about the problematic with complexity and humanity, and without taking sides or engaging in all the fashionable moral hectoring that passes for serious thought these days.' - Eimear McBride

Nuanced, daring and tender, these essays from the celebrated author of This is Pleasure and Bad Behavior, consistently fascinate and provoke. Mary Gaitskill takes on a broad range of topics from Nabokov to horse-riding with her unique ability to tease out unexpected truths and cast aside received wisdom.

Written with startling grace and linguistic flair, and delving into the complicated nature of love and the responsibility we owe to the people we encounter, the work collected here inspires the reader to think beyond their first responses to life and art. Spanning thirty years of Mary Gaitskill's writing, and covering subjects as diverse as Dancer in the Dark, the world of Charles Dickens and the Book of Revelation with her characteristic blend of sincerity and wit, Oppositions is never less than enthralling.

About the Author

Mary Gaitskill is the author of the story collections Bad Behavior, Because They Wanted To, and Don't Cry, the novels Veronica, The Mare and Two Girls Fat and Thin, the novella This is Pleasure and the memoir Lost Cat. She has received a Guggenheim Fellowship and her work has appeared in the New Yorker, Harper's, Esquire, The Best American Short Stories, and the O. Henry Prize Stories.