The Oasis
A Novel
A vicious and brilliant satire of human vanity from the author of the classic bestseller The Group
Long out of print, Mary McCarthy's second novel is a bitingly funny satire set in the early years of the Cold War about a group of writers, editors, and intellectuals who retreat to rural New England to found a hilltop utopia. With this group loosely divided into two factions—purists, led by the libertarian editor Macdougal Macdermott, and the realists, skeptics led by the smug Will Taub—the situation is ripe not only for disaster but for comedy, as reality clashes with their dreams of a perfect society.
Though written as a roman à clef, McCarthy barely disguised her characters, including using her former lover Philip Rahv, founder…