For the last thirty years Stephen Dixon has written fiercely intellectual examinations of everyday life, challenging his readers with prose that rivals the complexities of William Gaddis and David Foster Wallace. Fantagraphics Books is proud to re-present his 2010 hardcover collection of short stories, What Is All This?, in paperback form. Centrally concerning himself with the American condition, Dixon explores obsessions of body image, the increasingly polarized political landscape, sex — in all its incarnations — and the gloriously pointless minutiae of modern life, from bus rides to tying shoelaces. Using the canvas of his native New York he astutely captures the edgy madness that infects the city through the neuroses of his narrators with a style that owes as much to Neo-Realist cinema as it does to modern literature.