How do the stories we tell about money shape our economies? Beginning in the late eighteenth century, as constant growth became the economic norm throughout Europe, fictional stories involving money were overwhelmingly about loss. Novel after novel tells the tale of bankruptcy and financial failure, of people losing everything and ending up in debtor's prison, of inheritances lost and daughters left orphaned and poor. In Downward Mobility, Katherine Binhammer argues that these stories of ruin are not simple tales about the losers of capitalism but narratives that help manage speculation of capital's inevitable collapse. Bringing together contemporary critical finance studies with eighteenth-century literary history, Binhammer demonstrates the centrality of the myth of downward mobility to the cultural history of capitalism-and to the emergence of the novel in Britain. Deftly weaving economic history and formal analysis, Binhammer reveals how capitalism requires the novel's complex techniques to render infinite economic growth imaginable. She also explains why the novel's signature formal developments owe their narrative dynamics to the contradictions within capital's form. Combining new archival research on the history of debt with original readings of sentimental novels, including Frances Burney's Cecilia and Camilla, Sarah Fielding's David Simple, and Oliver Goldsmith's The Vicar of Wakefield, Downward Mobility registers the value of literary narrative in interpreting the complex sequences behind financial capitalism, especially the belief in infinite growth that has led to current environmental crises. An audacious epilogue arms humanists with the argument that, in order to save the planet from unsustainable growth, we need to read more novels.

This book is the first study of writers who are both Victorian and indigenous, who have been educated in and write in terms of Victorian literary conventions, but whose indigenous affiliation is part of their literary personae and subject matter. What happens when the colonised, indigenous, or 'native' subject learns to write in the literary language of empire? If the romanticised subject of colonial literature becomes the author, is a new kind of writing produced, or does the native author conform to the models of the coloniser? By investigating the ways that nineteenth-century concerns are adopted, accommodated, rewritten, challenged, re-inscribed, confronted, or assimilated in the work of these authors, this study presents a novel examination of the nature of colonial literary production and indigenous authorship, as well as suggesting to the discipline of colonial and postcolonial studies a perhaps unsettling perspective with which to look at the larger patterns of Victorian cultural and literary formation.

Ocean as Method presents a new way of thinking about the humanities and the social sciences. It explores maritime connections in social and humanistic research and puts forward an alternative to national histories and area studies. As global warming and rising sea levels ring alarm bells across the world, the chapters in the volume argue that it is time to think through oceans to realign discourses which better understand our future. The volume: * Engages with the paradigms of oceanic narratives to identify connections between continents through trade, migration, and economic processes, thinking beyond the artificial distinctions between the Pacific, Atlantic, and Indian Oceans; * Discusses oceanic travel accounts by Muslim travellers to counter the idea that the colonial era was marked by European travel to Asia and Africa, without a counterflow of "native travel"; *Examines the connections between South Africa, South Asia, and South East Asia through histories of Indian indenture and the slave trade, and engages with the idea of the ocean and enforced movement; *Compares and connects recent scholarship in the social sciences and the humanities centring the ocean to break away from inherited paradigms which have shaped world history so far. As a unique transdisciplinary collaboration, this volume will be of much interest to scholars and researchers of history, especially oceanic history, historiography, critical theory, literature, geography, and Global South studies.

Peril and Protection in British Courtship Novels: A Study in Continuity and Change explores the use and context of danger/safety language in British courtship novels published between 1719 and 1920. The term "courtship novel" encompasses works focusing on both female and male protagonists' journeys toward marriage, as well as those reflecting the intertwined nature of comic courtship and tragic seduction scenarios. Through careful tracking of peril and protection terms and imagery within the works of widely-read, influential authors, Professor Chavis provides a fresh view of the complex ways that the British novel has both maintained the status quo and embodied cultural change. Lucid discussions of each novel, arranged in chronological order, shed new light on major characters' preoccupations, values, internal struggles, and inter-actional styles and demonstrate the ways in which gender ideology and social norms governing male-female relationships were not only perpetuated but also challenged and satirized during the course of the British novel's development. Blending close textual analysis with historical/cultural and feminist criticism, this multi-faceted study invites readers to look with both a microscopic lens at the nuances of figurative and literal language and a telescopic lens at the ways in which modifications to views of masculinity and femininity and interactions within the courtship arena inform the novel genre's evolution.

Literature has never looked weirder--full of images, colors, gadgets, and footnotes, and violating established norms of character, plot, and narrative structure. Yet over the last 30 years, critics have coined more than 20 new "realisms" in their attempts to describe it. What makes this decidedly unorthodox literature "realistic"? And if it is, then what does "realism" mean anymore? Examining literature by dozens of writers, and over a century of theory and criticism about realism, The Moral Worlds of Contemporary Realism sorts through the current critical confusion to illustrate how our ideas about what is real and how best to depict it have changed dramatically, especially in recent years. Along the way, Mary K. Holland guides the reader on a lively tour through the landscape of contemporary literary studies--taking in metafiction, ideology, posthumanism, postmodernism, and poststructuralism--with forays into quantum mechanics, new materialism, and Buddhism as well, to give us entirely new ways of viewing how humans use language to make sense of--and to make--the world.

We live in a world of stories; yet few of us pause to ask what stories actually are, why we consume them so avidly, and what they do for story makers and their audiences. This book focuses on the experiences that good stories generate: feelings of purposeful involvement, elevation, temporary loss of self, vicarious emotion, and relief of tension. The author examines what drives writers to create stories and why readers fall under their spell; why some children grow up to be writers; and how the capacity for creating and comprehending stories develops from infancy right through into old age. Entranced by Story applies recent research on brain function to literary examples ranging from the Iliad and Wuthering Heights to Harold and the Purple Crayon, providing a groundbreaking exploration of the biological and neurological basis of the literary experience. Blending research, theory, and biographical anecdote, the author shows how it is the unique structure of the human brain, with its layering of sophisticated cognitive capacities upon archaic, emotion-driven functions, which best explains the mystery of story.

Ocean as Method presents a new way of thinking about the humanities and the social sciences. It explores maritime connections in social and humanistic research and puts forward an alternative to national histories and area studies. As global warming and rising sea levels ring alarm bells across the world, the chapters in the volume argue that it is time to think through oceans to realign discourses which better understand our future. The volume: * Engages with the paradigms of oceanic narratives to identify connections between continents through trade, migration, and economic processes, thinking beyond the artificial distinctions between the Pacific, Atlantic, and Indian Oceans; * Discusses oceanic travel accounts by Muslim travellers to counter the idea that the colonial era was marked by European travel to Asia and Africa, without a counterflow of "native travel"; *Examines the connections between South Africa, South Asia, and South East Asia through histories of Indian indenture and the slave trade, and engages with the idea of the ocean and enforced movement; *Compares and connects recent scholarship in the social sciences and the humanities centring the ocean to break away from inherited paradigms which have shaped world history so far. As a unique transdisciplinary collaboration, this volume will be of much interest to scholars and researchers of history, especially oceanic history, historiography, critical theory, literature, geography, and Global South studies.

In Dockside Reading Isabel Hofmeyr traces the relationships among print culture, colonialism, and the ocean through the institution of the British colonial Custom House. During the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, dockside customs officials would leaf through publications looking for obscenity, politically objectionable materials, or reprints of British copyrighted works, often dumping these condemned goods into the water. These practices, echoing other colonial imaginaries of the ocean as a space for erasing incriminating evidence of the violence of empire, informed later censorship regimes under apartheid in South Africa. By tracking printed matter from ship to shore, Hofmeyr shows how literary institutions like copyright and censorship were shaped by colonial control of coastal waters. Set in the environmental context of the colonial port city, Dockside Reading explores how imperialism colonizes water. Hofmeyr examines this theme through the concept of hydrocolonialism, which puts together land and sea, empire and environment.

Drawing on classical Husserlian resources as well as existentialist and hermeneutical approaches, this book argues that critique is largely a question of method. It demonstrates that phenomenological discussions of acute social and political problems draw from a rich tradition of radically critical investigations in epistemology, social ontology, political theory, and ethics. The contributions show that contemporary phenomenological investigations of various forms of oppression and domination develop new critical-analytical tools that complement those of competing theoretical approaches, such as analytics of power, critical theory, and liberal philosophy of justice. More specifically, the chapters pay close attention to the following methodological themes: the conditions for the possibility of phenomenology as critique; critique as radical reflection and free thinking; eidetic analysis and reflection of transcendental facticity and contingency of the self, of others, of the world; phenomenology and immanent critique; the self-reflective dimensions of phenomenology; and phenomenological analysis and self-transfermation and world transformation. All in all, the book explicates the multiple critical resources phenomenology has to offer, precisely in virtue of its distinctive methods and methodological commitments, and thus shows its power in tackling timely issues of social injustice. Phenomenology as Critique: Why Method Matters will appeal to researchers and advanced students working in phenomenology, Continental philosophy, and critical theory.

Mutating Idylls examines the surprising presence of the antique literary topos of the idyllic landscape, the locus amoenus, in European literature from the latter half of the nineteenth century. The book sets out to identify how this topos, which generally has no place in politically and socially realistic and naturalist literature, actually does have a role to play. Chapters on central nineteenth-century authors such as Flaubert, Zola, Fontane, Verga, Hamsun, Austen, Eliot, Wilde, Jimenez, Cernuda, and Galdos demonstrate both the presence and the multiple refunctionalizations of the locus amoenus. The theoretical aim of Mutating Idylls is to rehabilitate the notion of literary topos. This feature is present in the introduction as a possibility in literary studies today. The chapters all argue in the direction of a notion of topos, which is more flexible than the one Curtius defines along the lines of formula or cliche. In this way, the book intervenes in at least three major fields of study: nineteenth-century studies, classical philology, and literary theory. Through empirical analyses covering diverse authors who all, more or less unconsciously, use the locus amoenus, Mutating Idylls offers a new understanding of the culture of writing in the nineteenth century and contributes to literary theory a rehabilitation of the important notion of the topos.

This book explores how the pregnant body is portrayed, perceived and enacted in Shakespeare's and his contemporaries' drama by means of a phenomenological analysis and a recourse to early modern popular medical discourse on reproduction. Phenomenology of pregnancy is a fairly new and radical body of philosophy that questions the post-Cartesian chasm of an almost autonomous reason and an enclosed and self-sufficient (male) body as foundations of identity. Early modern drama, as is argued, was written and staged at the backdrop of revolutionary changes in medicine and science where old and new theories on the embodied self-clashed. In this world where more and more men were expected to steadily grow isolated from their bodies, the pregnant body constituted an embattled contradiction. Indebted to the theories of embodiment this book offers a meticulous and detailed investigation of a plethora of pregnant characters and their "pregnant embodiment" in the pre-modern works by Shakespeare, Middleton, Webster and Ford. The analysis in each chapter argues for an indivisible link between an intensely embodied experience of pregnancy as enacted in space and identity-shaping processes resulting in a more acute sense of selfhood and agency. Despite seemingly disparate experiences of the selected heroines and the repeated attempts at containment of their "unruly" bodies, the ever transforming and "spatial" pregnant identities remain loci of embodied selfhood and agency. This book provocatively argues that fictional characters' experience reflects tangible realities of early modern women, while often deflecting the scientific consensus on reproduction in the period.

Contains personal accounts as well as psychoanalytic and literary analysis. Davoine is the leading figure in psychoanalytic/literary studies. Draws direct comparison between trauma in human history (e.g. WW1 and plague) and the COVID-19 pandemic.

Contains personal accounts as well as psychoanalytic and literary analysis. Davoine is the leading figure in psychoanalytic/literary studies. Draws direct comparison between trauma in human history (e.g. WW1 and plague) and the COVID-19 pandemic.

This volume looks at the implications of transcultural humanities in South Asia, which is becoming a crucial area of research within literary and cultural studies. The volume also explores various complex critical dimensions of transculturation, its indeterminate periodisation, its temporal and spatial nonlinearity, its territoriality and intersectionality. Drawing on contributors from around the globe, the entries look at literature and poetics, theory and praxis, borders and nations, politics, Partition, gender and sexuality, the environment, representations in art and pedagogy and the transcultural classroom. Using key examples and case studies, the contributors look at current developments in transcultural and transnational standpoints and their possible educational outcomes. A broad and comprehensive collection, as it also speaks about the value of the humanities and the significance of South Asian contexts, Transcultural Humanities in South Asia will be of particular interest to those working on postcolonial studies, literary studies, Asian studies and more.

How does a literary historian end up thinking in terms of z-scores, principal component analysis, and clustering coefficients? The essays in "Distant Reading" led to a new and often contested paradigm of literary analysis. In presenting them here Franco Moretti reconstructs his intellectual trajectory, the theoretical influences over his work, and explores the polemics that have often developed around his positions.
From the evolutionary model of "Modern European Literature," through the geo-cultural insights of "Conjectures of World Literature" and "Planet Hollywood," to the quantitative findings of "Style, inc." and the abstract patterns of "Network Theory, Plot Analysis," the book follows two decades of conceptual development, organizing them around the metaphor of "distant reading," that has come to define--well beyond the wildest expectations of its author--a growing field of unorthodox literary studies.

The only book to take a really broad look at literature and emotion from a variety of perspectives including neuroscience Section on theory introduces the more complex areas of affect theory and cognitive science so people can understand throughout the book Looks at a wide variety of literature but also features commonly studied writers such as Shakespeare, Chaucer, Austen and Woolf

* Contains brief extracts from the critical works themselves so lecturers do not need to turn to multiple books/photocopies - everything needed in one book * Focuses on the most frequently studied texts in English so will fit nicely onto most existing courses * Organised chronologically and broken down into the units most commonly seen on degrees so is much more user-friendly for beginners * Provides a solid history of literary criticism but also brings it right up to date - looking at the issues that engage students right now, such as ecocriticism and queer theory * Richard Jacobs is widely praised for his tone and style which is ideal for students - clear, engaging and accessible * The author has worked alongside specialists in Early Modern studies, Contemporary Literature, and American Literature to ensure the widest possible market for the book

This interdisciplinary volume explores how posthumanist approaches can illuminate current issues in bioethics and considers the relevance of these issues for the humanities, including questions of autonomy and authorship, and notions of ethical and juridical responsibility in the context of a changing understanding of subjectivity. With contributions from a variety of areas, including literature, philosophy, media, and policy-making, the book outlines the historical and philosophical development of posthumanism, and current key questions in bioethics. It generates a dialogue between bioethical approaches and the posthumanities, identifying ways in which posthumanist scholarship might be used to inform bioethical policy. The book also looks more speculatively at the future, and the potential implications of technological developments which are only beginning to emerge. It uses posthumanism to look critically at the humanism underpinning de-extinction science, considers the ways in which technology is re-framing our social and political imaginaries, and asks about the identification of future posthumans.

The Routledge Companion to Humanism and Literature provides readers with a comprehensive reassessment of the value of humanism in an intellectual landscape. Offering contributions by leading international scholars, this volume seeks to define literature as a core expressive form and an essential constitutive element of newly reformulated understandings of humanism. While the value of humanism has recently been dominated by anti-humanist and post-humanist perspectives which focused on the flaws and exclusions of previous definitions of humanism, this volume examines the human problems, dilemmas, fears, and aspirations expressed in literature, as a fundamentally humanist art form and activity. Divided into three overarching categories, this companion will explore the histories, developments, debates, and contestations of humanism in literature, and deliver fresh definitions of "the new humanism" for the humanities. This focus aims to transcend the boundaries of a world in which human life is all too often defined in terms of restrictions-political, economic, theological, intellectual-and lived in terms of obedience, conformity, isolation, and fear. The Routledge Companion to Humanism and Literature will provide invaluable support to humanities students and scholars alike seeking to navigate the relevance and resilience of humanism across world cultures and literatures.

How does Toni Morrison create and form her literary places? As one of the first studies exploring Morrison's archived drafts, notes, and manuscripts together with her published novels, this book offers fresh insights into her creative processes. It analyses the author's textual choices, her writerly strategies, and her process of writing, all combining in shaping her literary places. In a methodology combining close reading and genetic criticism, the book examines Morrison's writing-her drafting and crafting-of her fictional places. Focusing primarily on the novels Beloved (1987), Paradise (1997), and A Mercy (2008), it analyses particular instances of written places, illuminating the manifold ways in which they are formed as text, and showing the centrality of the ideas of joining in Beloved, transformation in Paradise, and articulation in A Mercy. Toni Morrison is a major literary figure in contemporary literature, and is commonly considered one of the most influential American writers of the post-1960s era. Investigating the conjunction of her texts and manuscripts, this book continues, extends, and supplements the rich body of Morrison scholarship by illuminating how the genesis and formation of her multifaceted literary places constitute vital parts of her fictional writing.

Shakespeare and Emotional Expression offers an exciting new way of considering emotional transactions in Shakespearean drama. The book is significant in its scope and originality as it uses the innovative medium of colour terms and references to interrogate the early modern emotional register. By examining contextual and cultural influences, this work explores the impact these influences have on the relationship between colour and emotion and argues for the importance of considering chromatic references as a means to uncover emotional significances. Using a broad range of documents, it offers a wider understanding of affective expression in the early modern period through a detailed examination of several dramatic works. Although colour meanings fluctuate, by paying particular attention to contextual clues and the historically specific cultural situations of Shakespeare's plays, this book uncovers emotional significances that are not always apparent to modern audiences and readers. Through its examination of the nexus between the history of emotions and the social and cultural uses of colour in early modern drama, Shakespeare and Emotional Expression adds to our understanding of the expressive and affective possibilities in Shakespearean drama.