Review of “Old School” by Tobias Wolff

Thomas Wolffe's "Old School" shows how books change young men's lives. As the narrator the student experiences books from situation, as parody, for competition tion and without irony.

Its wickedness is in the entirely male authoritarian structure. It is reactionary and the smartest kind of conformity. Disaster follows. Its culprit the Mind.

In that sense "Old School" shares the religiousness of the books its narrator examines. These are Humanities men. Snobs only the sense that they don't fight over food and they get to pick sides. American snobs.

Five Stars.