T. Coraghessan Boyle, The Inner Circle

Martin Kich (Wright State University)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 3.2.4: American (US) Writing and Culture: Postwar and Contemporary, 1945-present.
Vol. editors: Sofia Ahlberg (Uppsala University), Patrick Chura (University of Akron), Emory Elliott (University of California, Riverside), Dale Enggass (University of Utah), Christopher Hugh Gair (University of Glasgow), Matthew Hofer (University of New Mexico), Stephen E. Meats (Pittsburg State University), Kerry Myler (Birmingham Newman University), Justin Parks (UiT - The Arctic University of Norway), Nick Selby (University of East Anglia)

Dates

First circulation or publication 2004

Places

United States (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Novel

Resources

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This novel is set at Indiana University in the late 1930s when Alfred Kinsey (Professor K or “Prok” to his “inner circle”) was a faculty member there. Kinsey was not only conducting the research on sexual behavior that would make him famous—or perhaps infamous—but he was also teaching courses. One of those courses was a locally notorious seminar on marriage, which actually only hinted at the lengths to which he and his circle of assistants were willing to take their research. The novel is set into motion when an undergraduate named John Milk enrolls in the seminar after lying about being engaged to be married in order to be accepted into it. In his review for the

Chicago Sun-Times

, Randy Michael Signor perceptively describes this moment as Milk’s entering “the rabbit…

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2782 words

Citation: Kich, Martin. "The Inner Circle". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 11 July 2024 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=41649, accessed 08 September 2024.]

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