Fussell’s influence was huge, Vincent B. Sherry wrote in “The Cambridge Companion to the Literature of the First World War.” “The book’s ambition and popularity move interpretation of the war from a relatively minor literary and historical specialization to a much more widespread cultural concern. His claims for the meaning of the war are profound and far-reaching; indeed, some have found them hyperbolic. Yet, whether in spite of or because of the enormity of his assertions, Fussell has set the agenda for most of the criticism that has followed him.”

The lavish praise and commercial success of “The Great War” transformed Mr. Fussell into a public intellectual, or perhaps more accurately a public curmudgeon; he crabbed, for instance, about Graham Greene’s “inability to master English syntax.” Mr. Fussell brought an erudition, a gift for readable prose, a willingness to offend and, as many critics noted, a whiff of snobbery to subjects like class, clothing, the dumbing down of American culture and the literature of travel.

“Abroad: British Literary Traveling Between the Wars” (1980) examined a tradition in writing rarely examined by scholars, and it was hailed for its critical acumen, though it also includes a rant against tourists and tourism, which he decries as the antithesis of ennobling travel and the bane of real travelers.

“ ‘Abroad’ is an exemplary piece of criticism,” Jonathan Raban wrote on the cover of The New York Times Book Review. “It is immensely readable. It bristles with ideas. It disinters a real lost masterpiece from the library stacks. It admits a whole area of writing — at last! — to its proper place in literary history. Its general thesis is, I think, wrongheaded, even mean, but Mr. Fussell argues it with such force and clarity that he makes it a pleasure to quarrel with him.”

In “Class: A Guide Through the American Status System” (1983), he divided American society into nine strata — from the idle rich (“the top out-of-sight”) to the institutionalized and imprisoned (“the bottom out-of-sight”) — and offered a comprehensive and often witty tour through the observable habits of each.