
Rock of Pages: The Literary Tradition of 1980s Heavy Metal (excerpt)
In this excerpt of Rock of Pages, Jesse Kavadlo shows how heavy metal, literature, and the Cold War were bonded from the beginning.

In this excerpt of Rock of Pages, Jesse Kavadlo shows how heavy metal, literature, and the Cold War were bonded from the beginning.

Whereas the novel specializes in psychological interiority, video game storytelling allows players to experiment outwardly in world-colliding fashion.

The Illuminist: Philosophical Explorations in the Work of Alan Moore investigates the convictions and contradictions of the Great American (Graphic) Novel writer who is neither American nor a novelist.

Yes, Metallica were singing about death—the cartoon skulls and swords I doodled in my notebooks rendered sonically. But they were also singing about life.

The 1984 rockumentary, or mockumentary, This Is Spinal Tap is a prophetic parody where one can laugh about, laugh at, and be laughed at all at the same time.

The era of hard rock and metal Van Halen ushered peaked and fell when the 1980s ended, but comes back again as classic rock for today’s 13-year-olds.

The Piano is a ’90s-era postmodern stew of sensuality and death, realism and fantasy, stories within stories, feminism and psychology, and postcolonial imagery.

In the shadow of the “Happy Together” decade, Bob Batchelor’s the Doors’ biography Roadhouse Blues explores the dark and gloomy side of Jim Morrison and the band.

Louise Erdrich’s The Sentence becomes a way to acknowledge the surrealism that has always pulsated just beneath the surface of American life.

The 1980s began on 10 February 1978, with the release of Van Halen’s self-titled debut album, now celebrating its 45th anniversary.

Noah Baumbach’s adaptation of Don DeLillo’s White Noise shows what a movie can do, but mainly what fiction still does better.

How were Rage Against the Machine so far ahead of their time, not just as political bellwethers but with a sound reaching past genres to create something entirely new?