The end of the 'Great American Novel' ?

       In the Weekly Standard Roger Kimball wonders about The Great American Novel -- specifically; 'Will there ever be another ?'
       He observes:

I think that most of us would agree that, today, fiction exercises a different, and less vital, claim on our attention than it once did. Such, anyway, has been my observation. And I would go further. It's not just contemporary fiction that is suffering from this form of existential depreciation: The same thing, I believe, is happening, perhaps to a lesser extent, with the fiction of the past. The novel plays a different and a diminished role in our cultural life as compared with even the quite recent past.

       Possibly -- but I refuse to accept that .....