Class Porn

In this first novel about a young woman's search for self-esteem, there is less porn than there is pot-shotting at the iconography of academe. In the 1960s Eleanor Nyland teaches Basic (""Bonehead'') English at a university in ``Middle America'' where she lives with her husband, Frank, a rising star in literary criticism. When the philandering Frank leaves her for greater fame and more assertive women, Eleanor continues teaching, sits on various committeesusually as secretaryand with the encouragement of an old college roommate, begins work on a novel of feminist pornography. While she tries to figure out what pornography should mean when written for and by women, Eleanor is drawn into campus battles over war, sex and faculty issues. Although the men here remain mostly entertaining stereotypes, Eleanor becomes a more appealing figure as she slowly develops wisdom, humor and self-confidence. (June)