Freedom and The Corrections are addictive novels populated by full-bodied characters (though sometimes ridiculous subplots) and it’s hard not to be in awe of how much detail and life Franzen brings to his work. Pettiness and spite are fun, as is proclaiming the second coming of Tolstoy, but behind all the fuss, Franzen remains an immensely talented writer. Freedom got him on the cover of Time, which caused a flood of contempt predictably predicated on the words “white” and “male,” and then people got really upset because he wrote about how he didn’t care much for the Internet. He had a minor spat with Oprah that caused legions of readers to cry “Elitist!” For the elitists, Ben Marcus wrote a long polemic in Harper’s about how Franzen was a promoter and writer of middling, conventional literature. It’s hard to think of a writer in the recent past who has stirred up so much controversy over so little.

Since The Corrections shot him into the stratosphere of literary fame almost fifteen years ago, Franzen has become a lightning rod of controversy. Along with being a cogent statement about the trappings of fame, something of Franzen’s personal experience seems to resonate with these lines. You’re merely an object that people project their idealism onto, or their anger, or what have you”. It’s as if you’re not even there as a person.

In Jonathan Franzen’s latest novel Purity, Andreas Wolf, a sort of Julian Assange figure, speaks of his international fame, “people around you constantly project themselves on you.

Purity franzen review