125. The Sot-Weed Factor by John Barth

The Sot-Weed Factor (1960) is by that darling of literary theorists, John Barth, who later went on to write Giles Goat-Boy, Lost in the Funhouse and other early American postmodernist works. The novel recounts the story of Ebenezer Cooke, an 18th-century American ‘sot-weed factor’, or tobacco merchant. The title gives some indication of the book’s playful concerns. It is unapologetically ripped off from a previous work, a long satirical poem called ‘The Sot-Weed Factor’ (1707) by one Ebenezer Cooke, a real-life 18th-century merchant and traveller. Cooke’s poem is quoted extensively throughout the book, along with Barth’s copious invented additions, so that the reader is never quite sure what is ancient and what modern. Postmodernism re-defined many things, but perhaps among the most significant was the meaning of theft.

Consulted:
Harris, Charles B: Passionate Virtuosity: The Fiction of John Barth‎ (1983)