Beneath the unassuming surface of a progressive women’s college lurks a world of intellectual pride and pomposity awaiting devastation by the pens of two brilliant and appalling wits. Randall Jarrell’s classic novel was originally published to overwhelming critical acclaim in 1954, forging a new standard for campus satire—and instantly yielding comparisons to Dorothy Parker’s razor-sharp barbs. Like his fictional nemesis, Jarrell cuts through the earnest conversations at Benton College—mischievously, but with mischief nowhere more wicked than when crusading against the vitriolic heroine herself.

CONTENTS:

1. The President, Mrs., and Derek Robbins
2. The Whittakers and Gertrude
3. Miss Batterson and Benton
4. Constance and the Rosenbaums
5. Gertrude and Sidney
6. Art Night
7. They All Go

AUTHOR:

Randall Jarrell (1914–1965) was the author of six volumes of poetry and the recipient of the National Book Award for Poetry in 1961. Pictures from an Institution is his only novel.